The Adidas Predator boots are an icon in football culture - the brand new Predator Freaks are set to shake up the game once more
It was a former footballer who invented the Adidas Predator boot. Australian Craig Johnston was intrigued by the idea of using rubberised panels on football boots. It was all about getting better control.
Johnston's idea was based in science but it became a visual icon as the millennium dawned. The likes of David Beckham and Steven Gerrard were pioneers of the Predator; they had velvet touch, sure, but they were also the coolest players in the country. Some players definitely chose the Pred for its raised rubber control pads - others picked it because it was a beautiful design.
“It’s a marriage of art and science, I think that’s the thing that defines this franchise,” David Surace agrees, a designer on the brand new Predator Freak boots. He's worked at Adidas for 20 years - not exclusively on this brand - and he agrees with us when we tell him he has a hugely cool job.
“When the Predator first came out, it really was disruptive. It was bold - both technically in what it promised to do but also visually at the time. And I would say that that’s a key element of the Predator DNA, which comes all the way up to today with the Predator Freak.”
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Adidas Predator Freak boots
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The Predator Freak is very much in that vein. The first few Predator designs had subtle rubberised patches specifically on the part of the boot where you'd bend a ball like Beckham; the Freak has amplified with this idea to the max. These boots have what look like little rubber teeth across the boot itself - DemonSkin, Adidas calls it - for control all over.
