The Greeks too should get to use their own script too.

I wonder if Latin is more for the benefit of the refs and other officials?

Si

Why would the refs need more information than just the number on the jersey?

English will become the language of the world. But don't take my word for it, I also think serif's days are numbered....

$$ + €€€ ≠ Cyrillic

But that's the price the countries would have to pay for prosperity (or "prosperity").

Subtitles.

host country (along with Poland)

Cyrillic not used? I wonder why ... not popular, perhaps?

$$ + €€€ ≠ Cyrillic

It doesn't go very well with business picture of your company and it's not practical from some point.

I tried to find does Coca-Cola have Cyrillic version of packages for Cyrillic countries and found only a Russian version for some Olympic Games (not sure which one). And found that Coca-Cola in Bulgaria, in 1965 made one advert using Cyrillic as part of label:

http://en.coca-colahellenic.bg/Aboutus/History/

It's interesting, cause they have it, beside on English (Latin), for Arabic market adapted officially, but not for Cyrillic.

The typography of those shirts seems fairly abysmal in general. What about the typewriteresque, monoline, squooshed-looking (though probably compensated) serif we Swedes are stuck with on our shirts? http://www.flickr.com/photos/xink/6896496432/ *shudder*

I noticed a book in my local library entitled "English: the last lingua franca". I think the title is a good one; for the moment, English is indeed the world's dominant language. But eventually, they will improve Google translate, and people will no longer bother to learn foreign languages... for the same reason that schools no longer spend as much time teaching the intricacies of long division.

I think this is liberating; while I enjoy my fortunate status as a native speaker of English, I wish everyone else to share my good fortune in their own language - to have access to the world's literature without having to learn other languages.

Heh. An AI-complete task if there ever was one.

I thought that was official…

For your amusement and as a reading exercise I’ve compiled a list of the German team in Cyrillic :) Can you recognize the names?

Йоахим Лёв
Матс Хуммельс
Филипп Лам
Пер Мертесакер
Томас Мюллер
Мануэль Нойер
Месут Озил
Лукас Подольский
Марко Ройс
Андрей Шурле
Марцель Шмельчер
Бастян Швайнштайгер
Тим Вийзе
Рон-Роберт Цилер
Тони Кроос
Мирослав Клозе
Сами Хедира
Бенедикт Ховедес
Илкай Гюндоган
марио гётце
Марио Гомез
Джером Боатенг
Ларс Бендер
Холгер Бадштубер

I thought that was official…

That one I found also. Not sure if that's official look of Russian C-C those days. It have "Olympic Games" logo on it...

Not sure if that's official look of Russian C-C those days. It have "Olympic Games" logo on it...

But the fine print running sideways on the can says, “In Russia, Coca-Cola uses this logo. Inside, enjoy the same great taste.”

The making of money always trumps typographic accuracy ;-)

But the fine print running sideways on the can says, “In Russia, Coca-Cola uses this logo. Inside, enjoy the same great taste.”

True. My bad. Didn't saw it...

@Jens – Once I found a team list, I managed to stumble my way through despite my Mad Cyrillic Skillz. (Note to future reader: "Mad X Skillz" implies near non-existence of said skill.)

Scratch what I said about shirt type, I do really like the Czech blackletter (!):

That looks a bit like masking tape!

Nice; I discover this post after create mine 8)

I do really like the Czech blackletter

That looks a bit like masking tape

There’s a font for that ;-)
http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/phospho/adhesive-nr-seven/

By the way, it reminds me of the London Olympics identity too.

Now all we need is old style figures…

Now all we need is old style figures

Like in car plates?
(Here there would be a link to a recent thread on using old style numerals on license plates. But it looks it’s impossible to retrieve it, be it with Google, Bing, or DuckDuckGo).

Edit: Found it (http://typophile.com/node/93625) by accident in my bookmarks.

Blame FIFA.

Page 25, point 7.6

http://www.fifa.com/mm/document/tournament/competition/51/54/30/equipmen...

Tim

Phonological diaeresis, such as accents or umlauts, are permitted.

How liberal of them!

@RyanMaelhorn, On your second statement, I don't think so.

Agree with @JamesT here.

But then if we made every country do cyrillic there would be the question of which cyrillic. There's no way you'd get countries like Serbia to use Russian-cyrillic, for example (not if you don't want a fist fight that is, lol)

Aside from that (given that cyillic is only used by orthodox christian slavic countries), I'm baffled why the shirts use "sh" in place of "š" and "ch" in place of "č" or "ć"

@Jens Kutilek:
Looks like

Joachim Love, Mats Himmels, Philipp Lam, Per Mertesaker, Tomas Müller, Manuel Noyer, Mesut Ozil, Lucas Podolskiy, Marko Royce, Andrei Shirley, Marcel Shmelcher, Bastian Shvainshtainger, Tim Viyze, Ron-Robert Siler, Tony Cruise, Miroslav Cloze, Sammy Hedira, Benedict Covedes, Ilkai Gyundogan, Mario Gyettse, Mario Gomez, Jerome Boateng, Lars Bender, Holger Badshtuber...

but I can't be sure of the spelling of all those names.

And I certainly agree that not everyone would find Cyrillic readable.

But then if we made every country do cyrillic there would be the question of which cyrillic. There's no way you'd get countries like Serbia to use Russian-cyrillic, for example (not if you don't want a fist fight that is, lol)

Haha. Don’t exaggerate. There are no really significant differences in the style of letterforms between Serbian and Russian (or, more correctly, International) Cyrillic. However, there are differences in Cyrillic transliteration. For example, this is how the word ‘Cyrillic’ looks in seven Slavic languages using Cyrillic script:

cyillic is only used by orthodox christian slavic countries

Not so: you can hardly consider Kumyk, Nanai, Buriat, Dungan, and many, many other peoples either orthodox Christian or Slavic.

It's not the difference in the style, it's that the alphabet is different. As someone who is slavic and reads cyrillic, I myself can't decipher quite a few words in some languages because of the letters they use (which signify sounds that exist in all slavic languages, too)

besides a little hyperbole never did anyone much harm ;)

Not so: you can hardly consider Kumyk, Nanai, Buriat, Dungan, and many, many other peoples either orthodox Christian or Slavic.

Kumyk: only spoken in russia, notably heavily influenced by the language
Nanai: the language borrows heavily from chinese and russian, also because of its proximity to russia (since it's used in siberia) it uses exactly the russian alphabet
Buriat: the buryat republic is actually in Russia, also it uses mongolian script but slowly adopted cyrillic because of influence from the country
Dungan: the written standard for the language was created in Russia

you can hardly consider Kumyk, Nanai, Buriat, Dungan, and many, many other peoples either orthodox Christian or Slavic.

Nor can you consider them Russian. Even if they live close to Russia, or in Russia.

cyillic is only used by orthodox christian slavic countries

Cyrillic is used in a number of majority Muslim Turkic countries, for instance Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. Or were you referring specifically to countries participating in Euro 2012?

Nor can you consider them Russian. Even if they live close to Russia, or in Russia.

true, my statement should be amended to say orthodox slavic countries or regions that were influenced by them an adopted the alphabet as a result of long term contact

Cyrillic is used in a number of majority Muslim Turkic countries, for instance Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. Or were you referring specifically to countries participating in Euro 2012?

again, "stan" countries, meaning previously Russian country until the USSR was dissolved.

Cyrillic was developed in the Bulgarian empire in the 10th Century AD and it is the basis of many slavic alphabets. Instances where it might not be a slavic language are due to Russian influences where the countries/republics/regions adopted the alphabet as a result of contact with Russians.

While on the subject, it has never been 100% clear to me whether there is a regional preference for cursive-derived forms (и → u, т → m).

I don't think anyone is denying the central influence of Russia in the spread of the Cyrillic writing system to other peoples of the Soviet Union, but that's not what you originally said. You stated 'cyillic is only used by orthodox christian slavic countries', and that is what I was querying, because that has not been true for the better part of 100 years. If all you meant was that the Cyrillic writing system developed within the cultural framework of Orthodox Christian Slavic countries, then we don't disagree.