Indoor football is becoming more competitive and played to a higher standard each season so it's about time brands started recognising the demand for top-tiered footwear for the court and turf.
For years now, all of us that get forced inside by the cold and inclement weather wondered why our favourite FG boots could not have exact versions made for indoor and turf surfaces. How we would have loved to wear our adiPowers inside, or one of the PowerCats from Puma, but, if you wanted to do that, you had to settle for one of the lower tiers of the boots. Now, with what Nike has done with the current Superfly Elastico and the upcoming Magista X, it has us wondering what other top-tier boots might make the jump from pitch to indoor surfaces.
Nike have struck first blood. Nike did a great job with the Superfly Elastico, taking a fantastic firm ground boot and creating everything that we had originally enjoyed about it within an indoor package. With Nike, one has to think that their entirety of silos could make the transition with relative ease. The Tiempo is already considered a very durable boot, and while an AG version is nice, an indoor version of the Legacy shows that it would be a very easy for Nike to give us the Legend for our indoor needs.
The HyperVenom does seem like it would be a bit of an odd prospect. Not because of the difficulty to make it indoor capable, but because it seems like that type of move would effectively kill the Elastico line. It would also take a few upper additions and changes to make sure that the thin nature of the Venom would be able to stand up to the rigors of the indoor game or the harsh indoor turf. Although, the Premier is certainly something that we would be happy to see in ANY form...even in house slipper form.
For other brands, we would love to see them make the same jump as Nike. Seeing a top-end evoPower available to use on hardwood would be tasty. It would also certainly be fun to see what something as lightweight as the F50 or the Velocita might look like on the indoor stage, but the demands of an indoor sole and the necessary additions to prevent the absolute destruction of your knees would really change how light the shoe could end up being.
When it comes to adidas, they've already delivered in this department some years ago with an indoor version of the Predator Mania and the brand does attempt to give their Copa the ability to shift from inside to outside, but the idea of the current 11Pro or Predator Instinct available for our 5-a-sides would definitely be worth trying.
Despite a large variety of boots available for your short-sided ventures, there really aren't any indoor boots that have something as aggressive on the upper as the Instinct. Whereas, the 11Pro would just be a dream to wear no matter what you slapped on the bottom! And don’t even get us started on what Mizuno’s top-tier products would bring to the indoor game…(but, seriously Mizuno…. we’ll take a dozen).
Nike definitely made a simple change that could have serious long term ramifications on the indoor game. It seems unlikely that the Superfly and Magista will be the last two boots to make the top-tier jump to the small-sided game, and we certainly hope we don't have to wait long for the next indoor gem.
What current top-tier boot do you wish was available as an indoor option? What FG boot from the past do you wish had an indoor twin?
