German international Sven Bender has been spotted wearing a quite incredible looking adidas boot in pre-season, which begs the question are we looking at a new adidas boot silo?
We've got exclusive imagery of Bender sporting his unique adidas footwear, which is surprisingly quite eye-catching if adidas were hoping to keep the boots under wraps. The boots are blacked-out, but with the yellow addition your eye is immediately drawn to some unique technology adidas could be working on and developing.
Barring the World Cup and Copa Mundial, adidas have three established boot silos; Predator, F50 and adiPure. But looking at the images we have of Bender, these prototype adidas football boots don't appear to fall into any of the boot categories.
The incorporation of technology across the midfoot you would think rules this out from being an F50 or adiPure, which leaves the Predator as the only likely candidate. However, there doesn't appear to be a classic Predator vamp, so unless as we've seen with the LZ boots adidas are firmly moving the Pred more into a more 'control' category, are we looking a ground-breaking new boot silo?
We're either looking at the new Pred or a completely new silo, and adidas have given us a few clues as to what to expect. We can see a quilted leather toe area, we're unsure if the remaining upper is leather, but this is a clear indication of comfort and ball feel. Once again faith is being placed in the speed outsole, which once again utilising their Sprintframe technology as rolled out across all their boot silos.
Most interesting is the synthetic material wrapping around the midfoot, which would suggest support and fit but at the same time is positioned in an optimal striking position, so could have some rebound properties. Undoubtedly there is more tech yet to be revealed, and we'll be keeping a close eye as this boot story unravels.
Stay tuned to SoccerBible as we investigate further, and break any news regarding a potential new adidas boot silo or Predator. From these first exclusive images we'd love to hear what you think? Share your thoughts online, on Twitter and on Facebook.