Giving us a glance at tomorrow’s Future today, Manchester United’s Brandon Williams has stepped out for training in what looks to be a next generation of the PUMA boot, and it looks to have had a fairly substantial redesign.
While some new generation boots tweak what is an already decent concept, ironing out the creases so to speak, PUMA look to have taken a fairly radical approach to the Future silo for its next iteration. While one of the key features of the Future has always been the adaptive lacing options, first impressions of this next-gen boot look like the laces could be abandoned all together…
The Future sits alongside the Ultra in PUMA’s new look roster, but the Future has been around for several years now, originally debuting back in 2017. For this latest update, the alterations seem pretty radical, if the prototype on Brandon Williams’ feet are anything to go by. It’s not been entirely unusual to see players removing the laces from the Future silo in the past, but it looks as though that may have spurred PUMA on to ditching the string altogether. The German brand have yet to venture into the realms of laceless technology, but this latest Future could be the first to do so.
Having said that, there is an obvious band that appears to wrap around the mid foot of the boot – could this be in place of any lacing, present to still aid lockdown? It’s hard to tell from the one picture, and while Brandon Williams hasn’t been alone in testing the prototype out – Borussia Monchengladbach’s Yann Sommer has also been seen in them – the picture of Williams is our best look yet.
So what else could this new boot have in store? Or should we say who else. For while Neymar joined the PUMA ranks recently, lacing up in the iconic King boot, our money would be on him switching into this new Future upon release. Early predictions were that he'd face up the Ultra, and when that didn’t happen it raised a few eyebrows. But in fairness, it might be that that ship had sailed, the Ultra having released over a month previously.
Sure the King is a classic, but it isn’t really Neymar, is it? So it would certainly make sense if he was being held back for something else for which the impact of his image could be best leveraged… something not out yet but that is coming in the near – you guessed it – Future.
Watch this space for more news on the next-generation PUMA Future...
