Tom Marchitelli worked as an accountant for a hedge fund for eight years before setting up a side hustle that soon became his full-time business.

Marchitelli started a custom menswear clothing business called Gentleman’s Playbook a decade ago. Since then, he has accrued approximately 500 clients, the majority of whom are professional athletes in the NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB, and on the PGA Tour.

When The Athletic spoke with Marchitelli, he was heading to an airport in Dallas after a meeting with a baseball player.

In his role as personal designer, stylist and tailor, Marchitelli handpicks entire wardrobes for a clientele which includes Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. During the different pre-seasons across the United States’ various leagues, Marchitelli is rarely in one city for long. As well as working on a lookbook of outfits for specific events, the majority of his work centres around personalising entire collections of tunnel fits for the athletes he works with.

“Tunnel fits” is the phrase used to describe what sportsmen and women wear when they turn up at venues for games (‘fits’ being short for ‘outfits’).

Usually, athletes arrive in the tunnel beneath the arena wearing their best outfits, which is where the name derives from. Think of it as a pre-game runway, where players across sports in North America showcase their personalities through what they wear.

The most fashion-conscious athletes, such as Houston Texans’ Stefon Diggs or Oklahoma City Thunder’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, will go big, but others prefer to keep it simple.

Kyle Kuzma was in the former camp, and is now the latter. The Washington Wizards forward recently announced his ‘retirement’ from the tunnel walk after taking the game to heights with choices including an incredibly oversized pink Raf Simons jumper and a black Rick Owens puffer jacket.

“I don’t want to be a part of that type of community where you have to put on a ’fit. I’m really taking a backseat to all of that,” Kuzma told Vogue in October.

While Kuzma has checked out and traded in a palate of high fashion for plain-tasting sweatsuits, in Europe, footballers are only just checking into the world of tunnel fits.

“It is a sport within sports (in the U.S.),” Marchitelli says. “Social media plays a huge role, because all major sports teams have media people who are in charge of photographing the players as they enter.

“That’s only been around, I would say maybe eight years, because when I first started, that (posting images of players arriving to games on social media) wasn’t a thing. And then it started becoming so visible.

Kyle Kuzma, pictured in 2022 (left) and 2021, has ‘retired’ from deliberate tunnel fits (Getty Images)

“You’re getting a close and personal look at what athletes look like when they’re not in their uniforms (team kit), and how they are choosing to express themselves. And, over time, players have taken more pride in how they show up for work.

“Another big factor that drives it is competition among players. These guys are trying to outdress guys on their team, guys on other teams across their sport, and even crossing over into other sports.

“When they show up to the arena, they’re given the uniform that they’re forced to wear, so they don’t have any real choices of self-expression other than their shoes, cleats (boots), maybe a wristband accessory or a headband. But the outfit that they wear to show up to the game, they’re able to express how they feel and how they want to look.”

Marchitelli could field a team in each men’s major sports league with the number of clients he has, but not a single one is a professional footballer despite MLS and NWSL teams having both dabbled in this subcultural movement.

In European football, tunnel fits are almost nonexistent. France international Jules Kounde led the way for Barcelona in recent seasons with his ensembled looks which blend vintage finds with high fashion. This season though, Barca players are no longer been allowed to arrive for games in their own clothes. This has led Kounde, a face now as recognisable in fashion quarters as much as football, capturing his fits to share with his followers on social media after matches instead.

Most teams have a strict club-tracksuits-only policy applied to matchday and this is one of the main reasons why pre-game tunnel fits have not yet taken off in football.

So where is the individuality? The answer to that does not yet reside in the underbelly of stadiums but in the car parks of the sport’s training grounds. Heading into training for your club or national team has slowly evolved into a time when players across the men’s and women’s games can showcase their style in the form of arrival fits.

Showing up for international duty, in particular, has become a moment for players to demonstrate their fashion prowess.

Last month, Liverpool defender Ibrahima Konate arrived at France’s training ground wearing a neon green hood zipped over his face while his international team-mate Marcus Thuram, often bedecked in Balenciaga and Chrome Hearts, is among those also paving the way.

Konate arrives for international duty with France in October (Franck Fife/AFP via Getty Images)

Players of Argentina, Belgium and Portugal are three other standouts who consistently show up. Meanwhile, England — whose players include Louis Vuitton brand ambassador Jude Bellingham — are still strutting around in team-supplied Nike tracksuits, proving the trend has not completely caught fire everywhere.

“It was probably 2022 when that (arrival fits) wave really began,” Jordan Clarke, founder of Footballer Fits, a platform which celebrates footballer fashion, says.

Clarke noticed that Premier League team Crystal Palace had started putting pictures on Instagram of their players arriving at their south London training ground wearing their own clothes. After starting a conversation with the club, Footballer Fits and Palace have been collaborating on Instagram posts to showcase what players are wearing ever since.

“Now we’ve done it with Chelsea, Nottingham Forest, Anderlecht in Belgium, we’ve done it with Brentford a lot, we’ve done it with Crystal Palace Women, Chelsea Women — there are so many,” says Clarke, who hopes that arrival fits are a precursor to tunnel fits becoming a regular sight in football.

“I don’t want to leave anyone out, but we’ve done it with so many clubs and now you’re seeing Liverpool, Newcastle United and Manchester City maybe not doing it in collaboration with us, but they’re doing it (themselves) now, and that’s amazing to see.

“With training, there is a lot less pressure. They (clubs) can release photos midweek and whatever happens on the weekend, unless you’re a super-negative person, I don’t think people are going to link back to what the players wore to training as the reason why they lost.”

Siobhan Wilson is one of the players who has featured on Footballer Fits’ Instagram page in collaboration with her club, Birmingham City Women, and she would welcome an escape from the traditional pre-match tracksuit.

“It actually annoys me, you know — especially when you see what they are doing in the WNBA,” says the 30-year-old Jamaica international with a laugh. “I wish we did stuff like that here. They just want us to all look like clones of each other, but it’s fine.”

Wilson used to deliver mail while playing part-time for Palace. She now combines a full-time playing career at Birmingham, who are top of the second-tier Championship, with being a fitness influencer to 1.3million followers on TikTok.

“It’s nice for the fans to see players express themselves through what they’re wearing and their style,” she says. “You get to see people’s personalities by doing that, so it would be something that I would love to see more of.

“For me, I feel like if you’ve got like a nice ’fit on, and a good pair of shoes on, you just feel good. But I get the other side (players arriving in uniform tracksuits) too. It is a team game. You’re there to play as a team, so I get it from that standpoint, but wearing your own clothes and feeling comfortable in what you’re wearing: it allows you to be yourself a bit more.”

Martin Odegaard and Arsenal arriving in team gear to play Chelsea this month (Stuart MacFarlane/Arsenal FC via Getty Images)

Algen Hamilton is a designer and stylist from south London.

His break in the fashion industry arrived when he started styling looks for footballer friend Reiss Nelson, the Fulham winger (on loan from Arsenal) who he met at primary school aged four. Hamilton’s client list includes Trevoh Chalobah (Crystal Palace, on loan from Chelsea), Kai Havertz (Arsenal), Joe Willock (Newcastle), Ben Chilwell (Chelsea) and Mateo Kovacic (Manchester City).

“I’ll work with them constantly throughout the season, whenever they want to — when they have an event coming up or they have an awards ceremony or they’re going to a premiere,” Hamilton, 24, explains. “When it comes to arrival fits, those looks normally come from the wardrobe I create and I’ll update it multiple times in a year.

“I speak to them first about what they want to wear and what the vibe is that we are going for, if it’s different to before, where they are travelling to et cetera. Then I’ll go off, make the outfits and send them a message. They will tell me which outfits they love.

“So, for example, I’m working with Trevoh right now. We made a whole bunch of outfits, which he picked, and then there are brands who want to gift some stuff for winter.”

Amadou Onana, left, checks in for Belgium duty in 2023 (Nico Vereecken/Photo News via Getty Images)

Having worked with Chalobah on a full-time basis since 2021, Hamilton has watched the progression of football and fashion’s relationship firsthand.

“When I first started, players weren’t really going out there dressing up like they do now, and it wasn’t just the Premier League — we are talking La Liga (its Spanish equivalent) and the Bundesliga (the top division in Germany),” he says.

“Also, brands weren’t really opening up partnerships to football players either. As time has gone by, the popularity has grown and supporters are tapping into the player outside of the training ground and off the pitch. I feel like now, those opportunities are happening more. Players are more open with their fits and want to show them off.

“We have watched the game change bit by bit and it is only a matter of time for it to get to that stage where it’s like the sports are in America. But let’s not mix a step forward with progress, because it can be a step forward seeing teams do that (post-arrival fits on social media) but it doesn’t mean it’s actual progression for the teams to change their minds.

“The Premier League is very traditional. They’ll probably be the last league that will change how things are.

“It would be nice for the progress to be meaningful; for it (wearing an arrival outfit) not to be looked at as a distraction or as a moment where players aren’t focused on what the team objectives are, but to see it as an opportunity where players are expressing themselves.”

GO DEEPER

Footballers, modelling and the power of expression

(Top photos: Getty Images; design: Kelsea Peterson)

Jason Kelce is expanding his media resume.

The future Hall of Famer, who is a podcast host and “Monday Night Football” analyst, announced Thursday he will host a late-night show on ESPN.

Kelce made the announcement during an appearance with Jimmy Kimmel, a future rival.

“I loved late-night shows. I’ve always loved them. I remember sleepovers watching Conan O’Brien with my friends,” Kelce said on Kimmel’s show. “We’re going to have a bunch of guys up there — legends of the game, friends that I played with, coaches, celebrities.”

The first four episodes of “They Call It Late Night With Jason Kelce” will be broadcast in front of a live audience at Union Transfer in Philadelphia, where Kelce played all 13 of his NFL seasons with the Eagles.

Jason Kelce waves to fans at the 18th hole at the 2024 American Century Championship at Edgewood Tahoe Golf Course July 14, 2024, in Stateline, Nev.  (Isaiah Vazquez/Getty Images)

The first episode will be taped the evening of Jan. 3 and will be broadcast the following morning at 1 a.m. ET. ESPN will record four more shows, and the final broadcast is scheduled for Feb. 1.

Kelce and his younger brother, Travis, launched a podcast, “New Heights,” in 2022, a few months before facing each other in the Super Bowl.

After Travis won that Super Bowl, he hosted “Saturday Night Live,” and Jason made an appearance. Travis is also the host of the show “Are You Smarter Than A Celebrity?”

Jason Kelce poses for a photo with Kylie Kelce during the “Kelce” documentary premiere at Suzanne Roberts Theatre Sept. 8, 2023, in Philadelphia. (Cooper Neill/Getty Images)

Kelce’s wife, Kylie, announced Friday she is pregnant with the couple’s fourth daughter. In his career, he made seven Pro Bowls and was a six-time first-team All-Pro selection.

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One of the most iconic catches in NFL history — a play that would change Odell Beckham Jr.’s life — started with a misunderstanding and a poor route. Eli Manning is quick to remind his former New York Giants receiver of both whenever the play comes up.

And it always does. It’s one of the more indelible moments in the NFL over the last decade.

“It was kind of like bad, bad, bad … unbelievable. Or, oh, no, no, no … great job,” Manning said. “We laugh more about that. I recognize how good it was and eventually get to (acknowledging) that point, but with your pals, it’s always good to give them a little heat about what it could have been. It could have been a walk-in: double move, beat him by 5 yards, nice easy catch and cruise in for an easy touchdown.

“But that’s not the Odell way.”

For weeks during the 2014 season, Giants players and coaches learned about the “Odell way.” They watched a precocious rookie in practice snatch balls out of the air with a swipe of his hand. They saw him throw, punt and kick field goals, effortlessly launching footballs to improbable depths. They witnessed him nonchalantly perform eye-popping, athletic feats as if he had been doing them all of his life. His former Giants teammate, inside linebacker Jameel McClain, remembers watching Beckham and thinking, “Man, God really did a number on him.”

On Nov. 23, 2014, a MetLife Stadium crowd of more than 80,000 and a prime-time NBC television audience learned what the Giants already knew: Beckham was capable of the extraordinary. His one-handed — check that, three-fingered — 43-yard touchdown catch against the Dallas Cowboys on a ball that sailed behind his head electrified the world and transformed Beckham from an exciting, talented rookie into a sports phenom.

“During the moment, I didn’t know the magnitude of what actually happened,” Beckham said. “I only know the aftermath. It’s been my life ever since.”

The Catch That Broke the Internet.

Odell Beckham Jr. catches a one-handed touchdown and it is arguably one of the most iconic catches in NFL history. (via @nflthrowback)pic.twitter.com/SAchXm5uCv

— NBC Sports (@NBCSports) December 22, 2019

Beckham says that with a tone of acceptance, but also a tinge of regret. He appreciates the fame and fortune that the catch helped generate. He also resents that the catch is used to minimize the other accomplishments of his career. In many ways, Beckham and his most celebrated play have a love-hate relationship.

He’s 32 now, no longer a phenom but a veteran of 10 NFL seasons. The Miami Dolphins are his fifth team. He is closing in on 600 career catches, 8,000 receiving yards and 60 touchdowns. He might have been the MVP of the Los Angeles Rams’ Super Bowl LVI victory over the Cincinnati Bengals in February 2022 had his left knee not given out, forcing him to miss the rest of the game and the entire next season, altering his football future.

Yet, the one play that has largely defined his career happened exactly 10 years ago Saturday. Beckham’s catch while being interfered with by Cowboys cornerback Brandon Carr adorns countless highlight reels and is commemorated on T-shirts and posters on the walls of sports bars and man caves. It inspired scores of imposters and flashy one-handed catches to come.

A decade later, his connection with Manning is typically the yardstick for which all other acrobatic one-handed catches, such as the one Garrett Wilson of the New York Jets made late last month, are measured.

CATCH OF THE YEAR CANDIDATE FROM GARRETT WILSON

@nyjets pic.twitter.com/A3efxJMIiF

— The Athletic (@TheAthletic) November 1, 2024

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“There’s always something about the original, and it was the first time I had seen something like that,” said Cris Collinsworth, the longtime NFL receiver who was in the NBC booth providing color commentary with Al Michaels for the Giants-Cowboys game. “Today, between the gloves, the balls aren’t as slick and these guys are freakier athletes. These guys are 6-4, 225 pounds, and they run 4.3 (seconds in the 40-yard dash). It’s just insane what they are able to do, so I try not to get so freaked out about it anymore.

“But yeah, when it happened, I thought (Beckham’s catch) was the best thing that I’d ever seen.”

It’s stood the test of time, too.

Beckham remembers it vividly. He was playing for LSU against Auburn in 2013 when he soared above the far sideline and tried to make a one-handed snag. He couldn’t haul it in, but he vowed that he’d make that play the next time the opportunity arose.

His inspiration came from LSU teammate Jarvis Landry. The two would spend hours outside their college dorm, throwing footballs to each other and practicing one-handed catches.

“That’s really how it came about,” Beckham said. “It really was a lot of Jarvis’ doing as far as the way he took me being a kid who was going to be good to understanding that I want to be a legend. I want to be remembered forever.”

The 12th pick of the 2014 NFL Draft, Beckham didn’t get  his professional career off to a great start. A hamstring injury sidelined him for much of training camp and the first four games of the regular season.

“He had a rocky start, and that New York media wasn’t friendly to him,” McClain said. “I remember having so many different conversations with him, like, ‘All of this is going to pass by, and the time that the world sees who you are is going to come.’”

In his regular-season debut, Beckham caught the game-winning touchdown pass against the Atlanta Falcons. Two weeks later, he had two touchdowns against the Cowboys. In the three games after that, he totaled 21 catches for 357 yards.

Beckham already had caught a 3-yard touchdown pass from Manning midway through the first quarter in the rematch against the Cowboys in Week 12 on “Sunday Night Football.” The Giants had designs on more when they had a first down on the Cowboys’ 43-yard line. It was the area of the field where Giants offensive coordinator Ben McAdoo liked to take deep shots, and the offense had been working extensively on different throws off bootlegs. One, in particular, called for Beckham to make an out-and-up move down the sideline.

As the first quarter ended, the coaches and Manning discussed the merits of a deep shot. Giants head coach Tom Coughlin wasn’t sure it was the best time to try it. Beckham pleaded with Coughlin to keep the call.

“We were trying to figure out what shot to take, and that was one of the shots on the menu,” McAdoo said. “Good thing we didn’t talk ourselves out of that one.”

As Beckham jogged back on the field, it was either Coughlin or Manning who said, “Don’t rush the route.” It, however, was the last three of those words that stuck in Beckham’s head as he lined up outside and to Manning’s right: rush the route.

“We wanted to get a little comeback and go, and we were a little worried if we just did a straight fake and rollout, it would bring the safety over. So, we just kind of did a half roll,” Manning recalled. “I want to take my eyes to the middle safety, hold him a little bit and have a backside post. Pretend that you’re looking at that and then gear up, and you’re throwing the comeback and go no matter what. If we’re getting high (safety), it should be one-on-one. We got the look that we wanted.”

Beckham, indeed, rushed the route and didn’t sell the comeback. Carr wasn’t fooled, either. He was stride-for-stride with Beckham tracking the flight of Manning’s pass.

“Definitely not one of my best routes,” Beckham said. “He tried to squeeze me to the sideline, and I kind of did a basketball move. If somebody is posting you up, you pull the chair. I just kind of pulled the chair. The rest was history.”

Beckham slipped inside Carr, who grabbed the front of the receiver’s jersey and was immediately flagged. Beckham then elevated, reached his right arm well behind his head and secured the ball with three fingers before tumbling into the end zone.

“You can’t see where the ball is, and to still get your hands and fingers on it and somehow be strong enough in your fingers to hold onto that thing and pull it in while falling backward?” Manning said. “It doesn’t quite make sense. One of the all-time great catches.”

In three decades as a broadcaster, Collinsworth remembers two instances where he had to pause because he was stunned by what he witnessed. There was the interception by New England Patriots cornerback Malcolm Butler at the goal line in the final seconds of Super Bowl XLIX, and there was the Beckham catch.

When he spoke about the latter, he told the television audience, “That may be the greatest catch I’ve ever seen in my life.”

To which Michaels replied, “It’s in the conversation.”

“It was just special,” Collinsworth told The Athletic. “There’s some things that the more you slow it down, the better it gets. I thought that was one of those. It was like, ‘Oh, he did that?’ And then he got his feet in and he only got three fingers on it. It just kept adding up. It’s great to have those moments.

“When I was a kid, I can remember things that inspired me to want to play football or sports in general. I’m glad it happened. I’m glad there are Odell Beckhams in the world who can do things that other mere mortals can’t.”

McAdoo still recalls the look of astonishment on the face of the normally stoic Manning as he came to the sideline with the crowd buzzing after the catch. It never subsided throughout a game Dallas won 31-28.

“It was electric,” McAdoo said. “I’ve been a part of some big games, whether it was the Super Bowl, whether it was Aaron (Rodgers) and Brett (Favre) playing for the first time in the Metrodome. The buzz in the stadium after that happened lasted the whole game. It’s going to be hard to beat that catch.”

In many ways, the catch was buoyed by the perfect storm. It was a prime-time Sunday game, and NBC had a multitude of camera angles to do it justice. The game featured two big market teams with deep fan bases.

Beckham’s catch generated oohs and aahs from the crowd as it was shown across the stadium. The gasps kept coming as fans turned to their phones to keep watching clips of the reception.

“We’ve never had a play, I think in sports history, that went as viral,” said former Giants guard Geoff Schwartz, one of the first players to greet Beckham in the end zone. “That was sort of the start of social media being such an important part of our lives. Odell went from a first-round pick to a celebrity overnight.”

Said McClain: “That was one of those defining moments where it was like, ‘OK, world, welcome your new star.’”

Baltimore Ravens top receiver Zay Flowers was 14 when Beckham made the grab. Growing up in South Florida, Flowers saw a replay of the catch on his phone and went around showing his friends the highlight.

“I thought it was fake,” Flowers said. “I remember watching it over and over for like two weeks straight.”

Flowers and Beckham were teammates last year in Baltimore, and Flowers said the play briefly came up in conversation. When it did, Beckham told his teammate that the catch “changed his life.”

Zay Flowers’ locker is right next to Odell Beckham Jr.’s in the Ravens locker room. 😈 pic.twitter.com/9DeM8OvQBi

— Ryan Mink (@ryanmink) September 7, 2023

Beckham immediately achieved almost mythical status in New York, his every move garnering attention and headlines.

“It was like Bon Jovi coming back to the Meadowlands,” McAdoo said. “There was always a vibe about him and he was a performer.”

For Beckham, the true impact of his catch resonated when he’d see young athletes practicing one-handed grabs at schools and at football camps. He has traveled extensively overseas and been asked about the catch in Sweden, Norway and the Netherlands.

He’s flattered that it has inspired others, and he understands that his immense popularity around the globe — his 17.5 million Instagram followers were the most of any NFL player as of earlier this year — traces back to that November 2014 night, when he corralled a ball that seemed destined for out of bounds.

“In the most humble way, I can go almost anywhere in the world and people, for the most part, kind of remember that moment,” Beckham said. “Even people who don’t know football know me, which is a blessing. But, it’s honestly something that I never really foresaw. It came with that moment.”

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The way Beckham sees it, Michael Jordan had his crossover and game-winning shot against the Utah Jazz in Game 6 of the 1998 NBA Finals. LeBron James had his chase-down block against the Golden State Warriors in Game 7 of the 2016 NBA Finals.

He has the one-handed catch against the Cowboys.

“People want to amount my entire career to just one catch, but there’s so many other plays that happened and things that I did, where it’s just hard to be like, ‘Yeah, he only had one catch,’” Beckham said. “I’ve caught the ball multiple times with one hand. Everything in life is about timing, and it was pretty crazy timing. ‘Sunday Night Football.’ New York Giants, Dallas Cowboys. It’s something that I’d never trade for the world.

“Here I am today. It’s taught me the hardships, the good times, all of those things.”

(Illustration: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic; photos: Al Bello / Getty Images)