The 8 most expensive football shirts ever sold | OneFootball

Highlights

Football shirts are becoming increasingly popular collectables around the globe nowadays, as fans flock to buy the latest strips. The most desired jerseys are the match-worn ones that players don on the most glamorous stage of all. And often, those are the pieces which are auctioned for thousands of pounds.

Six of Lionel Messi's 2022 World Cup shirts were sold for an eye-watering £6.1m ($7.8m), Sotheby's Auction House announced. “These historic shirts are not only a tangible reminder of one of the most important moments in the history of sports, but are principally connected to the pinnacle moment in the career of the most decorated football player in history,” Brahm Wachter, Head of Modern Collectables at Sotheby, said in a statement.

The Argentine is widely regarded as one of the greatest players to ever grace a football pitch and winning the World Cup was viewed as his crowning moment to cement such a notion. Though, there will always be fans who prefer the brilliance of Cristiano Ronaldo and those debates will likely continue to rumble on for years to come.

Quite remarkably, Messi's multi-million-pound shirts aren't the most valuable piece of footballing memorabilia on this list, there is one item that pips the lot. So stay tuned for that, as GIVEMESPORT takes a look at the eight most expensive football shirts ever sold.

8 Eric Cantona - £15,350

Eric Cantona's final Manchester United shirt fetched £15,350 in a radio auction in May 1997. Key 103, a Manchester-based station, sold the signed No.7 shirt to help raise testimonial funds for ex-Coventry City defender David Buust, who suffered a career-ending injury against United at Old Trafford in April 1996. An unnamed family from Manchester bought the jersey and the Frenchman donated the money to Buust just 24 hours before his shock retirement aged 30. The towering centre-forward signed off his glittering United career with 82 goals in 185 appearances. Cantona's last outing came during a 2-0 win against West Ham United.

7 George Best - £24,000

George Best's 1970 Manchester United shirt sold for £24,000 at Christie's 2006 auction. The Northern Irishman netted six goals, donning the strip as United defeated Northampton 8-2 in the fifth round of the FA Cup. The fleet-footed wide player was being marked by Roy Fairfax, who later said: "The closest I got to him was when we shook hands after the game."

Best said afterwards: "I don't really class myself as a footballer. I call myself an entertainer. I know a lot of people have paid to see me do something spectacular and that's what I was trying to do on Saturday. It's my job to do something that will send people away feeling that they'd like to see me play again." The legendary No. 7 was prolific in front of goal that season, surpassing the 20-goal mark despite being in a side that finished in eighth.

6 Paul Gascoigne - £28,680

Paul Gascoigne's 1990 World Cup shirt was sold for £28,680 at Christie's auction in September 2004. The England ace wore the strip during the semi-final defeat against West Germany, a game in which he appeared to shed tears when he picked up a yellow card, ruling him out of the final. The No. 19 jersey was signed by Gazza's teammates and was expected to fetch no more than £20,000, but a private buyer paid £10,000 more.

The Three Lions' heartbreaking penalty shootout defeat - which was viewed by a record 25 million people across BBC and ITV - was no deterrent to the buyer, who made the kit one of the most expensive in the world.

5 Cristiano Ronaldo - £39,000

Ronaldo's final Manchester United top was auctioned in November 2022 and sold for £39,000 to an unnamed Chinese bidder. The Portuguese superstar sported the away strip during a 3-1 defeat to Aston Villa, though, despite the poor result, the white Adidas-made kit still fetched a colossal sum of money. Ronaldo captained his side during the game before his infamous interview with Piers Morgan aired, which ultimately ended his second spell at Old Trafford.

While it wasn't the most glamourous ending to his second United career, he is still widely regarded as one of the greatest players to ever grace the 75,000-seater Theatre of Dreams. Ronaldo scored 145 times in 346 appearances for the Red Devils in total, winning nine major trophies.

4 Sir Geoff Hurst - £91,750

Sir Geoff Hurst's World Cup final shirt sold for a mammoth £91,750 in September 2000, making it the most expensive football jersey in history at the time, until Pelé's Brazil number eclipsed it a couple of years later. The ex-England forward netted a hat-trick against West Germany to help his nation acclaim their first and only triumph on the international stage. The British collector who won the auction was thought to be holidaying in Australia for the Olympic Games when he made the bid via telephone and was described as 'overjoyed' at his purchase. "He doesn't want to be named, but he comes from west London and the shirt will now take pride of place in his private collection at home," the auction house's spokeswoman Jill Potterton said.

3 Pelé - £157,000

Pelé's 1970 World Cup Brazil shirt was sold for £157,750 in 2002, and it was the most expensive football jersey ever at the time. The legendary forward, who is widely regarded as one of the best players of all time, wore the shirt during the final against Italy. His side cruised past Gli Azzurri, winning 4-1, and he opened the scoring with a well-placed header.

The final auction price was three times the amount they were expecting and the person who bought the shirt remains a mystery, as the buyer declared himself anonymous. Roberto Rosarto, a former Italy international who swapped shirts with Pelé, was the recipient of the sizable bid.

Speaking in his autobiography, Pelé recalled: "The second the final whistle blew, crowds poured from the stands like hungry wolves. I was without clothes in seconds, except for a small pair of underpants. Shirt, shorts, socks and shoes were gone in an instant." Quite clearly the fans recognised that one day any bit of memorabilia attached to Pelé would go on to sell for a substantial sum of money. And so it did.

2 Lionel Messi - £6.1m

It's important to note, that the £6.1m outlaid on Lionel Messi's shirts, wasn't just for one, it was for a set of six from his historic World Cup campaign in Qatar. Notwithstanding that, it was the highest price for an item of sports memorabilia in 2023, according to Sotheby.

Football fans have long craved to see Messi hold aloft the iconic World Cup trophy, and that was finally seen in December 2022, when his Argentina side defeated France in the final via a penalty shootout. At age 35, it was by his own admission his final outing in the most famed sporting competition of all, so to end it at the summit, bowing out with the most desired piece of silverware, was a moment to behold and one that transcended all of sport. Naturally, what followed was a scramble to acquire any bit of memorabilia he wore on that famous day from collectors all across the globe. The first point of call was indeed the shirt he wore.

December 2023 saw six of his jerseys sold, with a portion of the proceeds going towards a Barcelona charity Messi released a statement on Instagram, which read: "A portion of the proceeds from the auction will be donated to UNICAS Project, led by Sant Joan de Déu (SJD) Barcelona Children’s Hospital to meet the needs of children suffering from rare diseases."

1 Diego Maradona - £7.1m

Diego Maradona's Argentina shirt, which he donned during the quarter-final match against England in the 1986 Mexico World Cup, sold for a whopping £7.1m ($9m), smashing sporting memorabilia records. The left-footed genius netted a brace as his nation advanced with a 2-1 victory over the Three Lions to reach the semi-finals of the competition - which they'd eventually win. The last eight clash is often remembered for his first goal, as he palmed the ball past Peter Shilton. The Argentine playmaker told reporters post-match that his goal was "a little from the head of Maradona, and a little from the hand of God."

Later in the match, Maradona's brilliance came to the fore, as he scored one of the greatest goals ever seen in the history of the sport. Having dribbled from his own half past several England players, he rounded the onrushing Shilton and poked the ball home. Sections of the 114,000 fans in attendance at the Estadio Azteca erupted with elation whilst others, most notably the travelling England fans, were left stunned at what they had just witnessed. England forward Gary Lineker, who was on the pitch at the time, said: "It crossed my mind to applaud." Maradona's legacy is firmly cemented, and he will always be remembered as one of the greatest players to ever grace a football pitch.