In June 2025 Saudi Arabian side Al-Ittihad released a trio of black anniversary kits to celebrate the club’s 97th anniversary. Each of the three designs featured a black base with differently coloured applications (black, silver and gold), and though there were some people who rightly questioned why a club would release an anniversary shirt for their 97th year, the designs were largely well received.
As passé as it was to tap into both the black and gold and blackout trends simultaneously, it was not just the colours which felt familiar. If there was one prevailing sentiment surrounding the launch it was that everything seemed extremely AIK coded.
Swedish side AIK can arguably be considered as the godfathers of the modern blackout kit. In what became a yearly tradition, the team gained a global reputation for sleek, monochrome shirts which leant heavily on the collectible aspect of football kits. Lavish details and equally lavish boxes became a yearly spectacle, even if the queues to order and the debates around ‘flipping’ shirts caused frustrations on the other side of the coin.
With Al-Ittihad it was impossible to ignore the AIK comparisons. The styling of the shoot, the colours, even the typeface used for the year on the front of the kits; many rightly drew comparisons with popular AIK releases of recent times with the 2019 anniversary shirts bearing the most resemblance. If anything it looked as if the same people had been involved behind the scenes.
In reality, Al-Ittihad had completely ripped off AIK and stolen their font in the process.
Two weeks ago Erik Holm who worked as Head of Social Media for AIK between 2009-2016, called out Al-Ittihad for completely ripping off the font he had designed during his time at the club. In a post on LinkedIn, Erik detailed how the font (named “AIK ErikHolm”) had been downloaded from DaFont.com and used by Al-Ittihad without the club contacting him to obtain a license for commercial use as clearly stated.
And of course, as Erik rightly pointed out, the thieves in this case are backed by one of the largest sovereign wealth funds in the world. The Public Investment Fund (PIF) of Saudi Arabia took over Al-Ittihad and three other Saudi clubs in 2023 (Ronaldo’s Al-Nassr being another side under their control), two years after becoming majority owners of Newcastle United. To say it would be no skin off their back to pay the people they ought to have paid is a massive understatement.
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