PUMA and Saudi football giant AL-HILAL have unveiled their 2026/27 third kit, and the standout feature isn’t the cut or the colorway — it’s the chemistry. Under the tagline “A glory that continues to shine,” the jersey is finished in a deep, near-black tone with AL-HILAL’s signature sky blue running through the collar, sleeves and side panelling, but its real trick is hidden: a UV-reactive treatment that brings the PUMA and AL-HILAL logos into a visible glow after dark.
For marketers tracking how sports brands are engineering merchandise for content-era shareability, this kit reads as a deliberate two-act release. By day, it’s understated. By night, under UV light, the branding activates, a built-in incentive for fans and creators to capture and post the jersey in different settings and lighting.
Jonathan Bannister, Head of Marketing at PUMA Middle East, said the goal was to find “the detail that makes it personal to the club,” adding that the UV treatment “lets the jersey tell two stories depending on when you look at it.” He called it “one of the most technical pieces we’ve built for AL-HILAL, and one of the most meaningful.”
Vanessa Basora, Chief Marketing and Content Officer at AL-HILAL, tied the design back to the club’s identity, saying the kit “is about what stays with us” and was built for “the fans who carry the club with them everywhere, in every light.”
The release closes out AL-HILAL’s kit story for the season and underscores how PUMA continues to treat each drop for the club as a standalone brand narrative rather than a routine refresh — a cue for any brand marketer thinking about how to keep seasonal product releases feeling like news rather than merchandise.
