What basically passes for shorts these days are culottes. Now, this is an emblem of muddy thinking. Shorts are not culottes. Culottes are absurd French inventions that, typically of them, act as a foppish hat for the shins. Footballers only wear shorts at all to appear decorously presentable in mixed company. They don't actually need - nay, desire - the interference of cloth with leg. What they most certainly don't require is a baggy mass of material flapping against the thigh and hanging on or over the knee. This is simply wrong. Practically, sportingly and aesthetically, it is an abomination. It might be a cossie in the cupboard of Kevin Rowland, or wee Jimmy Krankie, or Elton John, or the preferred spring/summer leisurewear of John Bercow, but it is not - repeat NOT - appropriate leg wear for a professional footballer. It has to stop!