LONG READ Paolo Odogwu: 'I want to bridge that gap between fashion and sport and design our kit next year'

On Thursday lunchtime, from Italy’s team hotel in Dublin, Paolo Odogwu sent his marketing manager a text.

“Have we done the kit for next season yet? I want to help.”

Odogwu brings a unique expressionism to the game. He customises his boots, dyes his hair bright colours and celebrates like John Cena when he crosses the try line. He loves art and comics and anime. For several years, he ran his own clothing line, Composure Club, with close friend and team-mate Jacob Umaga, until the pair signed for Benetton and the logistics of running a UK business from the north of Italy became too challenging. In a sport still toiling to escape the shackles of conformity, Odogwu is at the frontier of cultural change.

 

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“I love being creative,” he says. “I want to help bridge that gap between fashion and sport. England have done a collaboration with Undefeated, a streetwear brand, and Castore. Me and Jacob have done a few things with the Counterruck brand. Rugby is going that way.

“I’ve already been doing all that stuff so I’m in the perfect position. In Italy you have so much exposure to fashion. AC Milan’s travel kit is made by Off White, one of the biggest brands in the world. Okay, I can see myself in that space. Especially being a player. I want to start doing it now while I’m still playing so I can have even more of an influence – I’m going to be the one wearing it.

“There is nothing worse than going through the airport as a full team feeling like ‘I hate these clothes, I don’t look good’ because we are representing the team wherever we go. If we are flying to South Africa everyone who sees that t-shirt or hoodie is going to be like, ‘these guys look a mess’, or ‘these guys look really smart’. The importance of pulling up to a stadium looking nice and feeling ready to go, and the feeling of oh, I’m just gonna throw this on, and not really caring about your appearance.”

All the other teams say it looks really cool. It doesn’t feel like teamwear. It feels like nice clothes which are also for your team.

Benetton, being a fashion juggernaut turning over 1bn Euro a year, are keen to support their player. Their post-match clobber is made by a Bari-based company called World of Colour. Recently, they flew Odogwu and a cameraman down to learn how the garments come to life and how his perception as athlete and designer could be harnessed.

“They make everything in-house, from design to finished product,” Odogwu says. “I got to do the whole process and made some t-shirts and sweatshirts. I had an idea of what I wanted to do, but speaking to their designers, it was really cool to have that outside inspiration. I don’t normally have that team around me.

“Everyone loves the after-match wear. Really nice materials. The fabrics are flexible. You’ve got big guys in the team so everyone is comfortable in it. All the other teams say it looks really cool. It doesn’t feel like teamwear. It feels like nice clothes which are also for your team, which is the kind of place I want to get to.”

Odogwu’s creative influence is growing at an encouraging rate. His agency, ISC, is launching a new range of apparel called Athletes by Design and approached the Italy wing to head it up. The concept is for athletes, by athletes.

He is heartened too by the gradual changing of attitudes across the sport. The rise of Henry Pollock, the vibrancy and individuality of England’s world champion Red Roses. Not every player wants to be like Pollock. Not everyone wants a social media following like Ilona Maher’s. But every player who does seek such public freedom, should feel comfortable doing so.

“With rugby pushing towards more pop culture clothing it is growing a lot more,” Odogwu says. “The England women’s team did a lot to help that with how they were at the World Cup and how they are doing their TikToks and just being themselves. I feel like it’s more accepted for them to have freedom especially with their outfits, dressing how they want, they’ve slipped into this really cool window of ‘we’re going to do what we want’, and we [in the men’s game] are still a bit behind.

“Pollock is one of the most followed players already and he’s only been playing two years. I love American football and there are so many characters, and you watch it for the characters as much as the game. They promote individuals really well. Why shy away from those individuals? The bigger they are, the bigger your team is, the more people who are going to buy tickets and jerseys. That’s the way it needs to keep going forward.”

I don’t understand why you do that to one of your own players who should have had one of the best days of his life and it’s just been ruined.

Against this backdrop, there are still jarring reminders of society’s ills. Odogwu played against Edwin Edogbo on Saturday. The Italian making his Six Nations debut. The Cork-born Munsterman winning his first Ireland cap. Heinous racist abuse forced the IRFU to turn off comments on their Instagram post marking the occasion.

Like many black athletes, Odogwu has experienced these horrors. When he was eight, two kids at school called him ‘Blackie’ and splashed water in his face. The Odogwus were the only black family in their genteel North Birmingham neighbourhood and his elder brother was once stopped by police and asked to prove he lived there. With his mighty thighs and stocky frame, successive coaches pigeon-holed him as piano shifter rather piano player. The Edogbo bile rankled anew.

“I saw it on Instagram and thought, how is this still happening?” he says. “It’s not like he’s just shown up from a different country and been capped. He’s been there the whole time, he’s as Irish as he can be, but just because he’s black they’re like ‘nah, not one of us’.

“I don’t understand why you do that to one of your own players who should have had one of the best days of his life and it’s just been ruined. He’s going to have that in his head the rest of his career. Then having the Vinicius Jr thing happen three days after. You think it’s going so far one way and things are really good and then… nah, there are still idiots out there.”

Edogbo’s roots were not lost on Odogwu. Like the 29-year-old, he is of Nigerian descent. Odogwu’s father, Stefano, is a half Nigerian, half Italian doctor, and flew from England to watch the match. It was the first time Stefano had seen his son play for the Azzurri live.

“I thought, how cool, we’ve got four people in an Ireland v Italy game who are of Nigerian heritage. Me, David Odiase, Edwin and Cormac Izuchukwu. You can see the diversity spreading into two countries which aren’t necessarily that diverse. You are making it into this professional sports environment and it’s such a big deal. Literally 10 hours afterwards that happens.

“Maybe some people don’t see it as a good thing. In 2026 when the world is so diverse, everyone moves everywhere, so many different people in different places, you can’t just expect it to be a team of people whose grandad’s grandads were in Ireland, never left the county.

“It’s the same for us in Italy. It’s how the world is now. Its normal. Also, do you not want the best players in your team? If they are of that heritage of have spent enough time in the country to quality, it’s not a bad thing because they have put in the commitment to be there.”

I never thought when I was playing in England that I would end up living in a city in the north of Italy thinking, this is home now. I don’t feel like I really want to go back to England.

In aftermath of the scrap at the Aviva, Italian players wore long faces. Odogwu entered the fray in the 66^th minute and felt the anxiety gripping the home crowd. “We’ve got them here,” he thought. The seven-point defeat was a missed opportunity.

Odogwu grew up watching Sergio Parisse and the Bergamasco brothers, a squad which often seemed sustained on gallantry and pride alone. Nearly three years and two coaches into his international career, the picture has changed dramatically.

“Everything was driven on passion. We literally say it in the anthem – ‘we are ready to die’ – that was the mantra. You felt it through the TV. Now, we still have that but we also have the level of detail and precision which perhaps were lacking 10-20 years ago to execute against these top teams.”

Odogwu was always deeply in touch with his Italian background. There were frequent family visits to Bologna and hearty platefuls of tortellini pasta. He never thought he’d actually build on that legacy himself.

He started out in the Leicester academy but never much cared for the “drill sergeant vibes” of the Tigers old school. There was a stint at Sale, the turbulence and trauma of Wasps’ demise where his brilliance earned selection for a wider England squad. After a brief spell in the fashion hotbed of Paris with those great aristocrats at Stade Francais, he joined the Italian side for the 2023 World Cup and signed at Benetton.

In Treviso, he’s found his Eden; a place that channels his passions and connects him to his family.

“My grandparents don’t know anything about rugby. They’d say, ‘Paolo is playing for Italy? Oh, in what?’ Growing up, we didn’t speak any Italian at home because we were in England. Now, I speak to my nonna in Italian and it’s cool we’ve ended up in that position. My two older brothers are jealous they can’t speak it.

“I love Treviso. The vibe is so relaxed, it’s such a beautiful city, everything is historic and clean. Sunday afternoon when everyone goes out for lunch or a spritz, it’s like a fashion show. Long coats, scarves, sunglasses on – everything designer. The sun is usually shining. I could see myself living in Treviso after I finish playing. I never thought when I was playing in England that I would end up living in a city in the north of Italy thinking, this is home now. I don’t feel like I really want to go back to England, or miss England. This is me now.”

On Sunday, all of Italy’s feelgood and all their development will be placed under the microscope. France are playing rugby from the gods and their people expect – perhaps demand – another Grand Slam to reflect the brilliance in their ranks.

“We have to keep the game structured,” Odogwu says. “They struggle the most when it’s a structured game. You try and keep it tight, close, don’t give them the space to run it back and offload and do what they want, and get them to a point where they try to force things.

“They’ve had something crazy like 40 offloads in two games. We’ve been practising trying to block the offload but on occasion it is still going to happen. It’s that mentality of working in a 15-man unit of containment, so if they get an offload the next man is there to make that hit. Never switch off. They will literally throw an offload through their legs, behind their head, whatever they want, but that will give you opportunities when they’ve thrown the wrong offload or gotten isolated.

“We have had a good start, the pack has been smashing it, backline doing well, but can we kick on? This is the biggest challenge we’ve had yet and probably the biggest one we’ll have in the tournament.”