Sporting Clube de Portugal 2009/10 Home Shirt

At first glance it is the 2009/10 Puma, with golden pumas and black details. What makes it rare sits on the chest: meo3D. At the end of that season, MEO launched Portugal's first 3D television channel and brought football into the new technology, so in selected matches the usual meo block gained a 3D suffix, a variant that lasted a handful of games and vanished along with the 3D fad itself. Around it, the shirt was a catalogue of period advertising: Super Bock above the name, BES and tmn on the shoulders, Liga Sagres on the numbers. On the back, the 31 of Liedson, the naturalised Brazilian who went to the World Cup with Portugal that year and kept doing what he always did, scoring. On the pitch the season was forgettable: Paulo Bento left in November, Carlos Carvalhal took over and Sporting slid to fourth, with the bright spot coming in the Europa League, where only Atlético Madrid, the eventual winners, stopped the Lions in the last 16 on away goals. A minor season, a major shirt: short lived, covered in sponsors and carrying the number of the best player in the house.

Here at Hoopster we also collect the details that lasted a handful of games: the meo3D of a technological fad that faded, on the back of a 31 that never went out of fashion. Rarities are made of accidents like these.