The Adidas Soccer Ball

"An Adidas soccer ball has spent a lot of time on the pitch at the World Cup, and on the majority of local soccer fields as well."

The soccer ball as we know it has undergone many changes in its lifetime. However most of that change has been in the 40 years. And it all started in 1970 with......

The Adidas Telstar

First ball to use the bucky ball design. 12 black pentagons, and 20 white hexagons.
This 32 panel design became the standard for soccer balls.
The black and white panels were to make the ball easier to see on tv.
Official match ball of the 1970 and 1974 World cups.
Telstar = Television Star
Completely made of leather. Synthetics have not yet appeared.

Next came the.....

Adidas Tango

This ball became the official World Cup ball for the next 20 years. It's triad design gave the impression that the ball had 12 identical circles on its face. The triad design would be adjusted for whichever country would be hosting the World Cup.

Official match ball of the 1978, World Cup.
Most expensive ball in history.
Most popular soccer ball design ever.

The Tango ball design lasted for a long time. But it eventually had to change. As all things do. The next step in the Adidas soccer ball revolution was the.....

Adidas Fevernova

The colors, color usage, and the design were all based on Asian culture, as Korea - Japan prepared to host the 2002 World Cup.

Criticized openly as being too light.
Some say early round upsets were because of the ball.
Was a 3 layer design that provided more accurate and predictable flight.
First ball to have a foam layer.

The next change came when Adidas introduced the......

Adidas +Teamgeist

Adidas added the "+" for trademark reasons, as the word "teamgeist" means "team spirit" and was not allowed to be used as a trademark.

First ball to have only 14 panels instead of 32.
Those 14 panels were curved.
The panels were bonded together, not stitched, making it almost perfectly waterproof.
Uniformly round to improve accuracy of flight even more.
Developed by the cooperation of Adidas and the Molten Corporation.

No matter which one you prefer, Adidas will provide a top quality ball for your soccer game.

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