The Belgian Goliath, who stands 6ft 7inches (200cm), is a standout goalkeeper on both the club and international level. Beginning his career in his native Belgium with Genk, before making the move to Chelsea, where he made a long loan stretch at Atletico Madrid before making over 100 appearances for his parent club. In 2018, Courtois switched London for Madrid once again, this time moving to Real Madrid where he has already surpassed 100 appearances so far.
A member on the Nike brand, he has worn the Nike Vapor Grip 3 for years now, receiving colour-ways exclusive to himself throughout his career, some of which we will cover later in this article. Unlike some goalkeepers, Courtois does not have many modifications to his gloves, similar to Alisson Becker. However he has had some preferences throughout his career. For more on another article on the Vapor Grip 3 range, check out our Jack Butland blog
The only real modification to the retail model is the latex, which is a professional grade contact latex reserved for only the top professionals, in recent years this has been purely white latex, this made it obvious on the recent range which featured black latex on the retail model but Courtois has modified pairs which feature white latex. Prior to the change of the cut of the Nike Vapor Grip 3, most ranges that Courtois wore had black latex rather than the colour that featured on the retail models, with some gloves occasionally featuring white latex.
The Vapor Grip 3 is a popular glove, which has been modified on multiple occasions and features a Hybrid Cut, prior to the most recent modification to the cut, this featured finger wraps on the Index and Pinky fingers as well as the thumb, like our Hawk GK 1NS Hybrid. But in recent editions the wrap has been removed but the cut is identical. There is two styles of cuts, with either a negative or a flat cut Middle and Ring finger. Courtois' gloves feature the latter, a cut that he has worn through all the modifications of the VG3.
During his time at Chelsea, Courtois wore a customised pair of the VG3, which wear painted on with a Fortnite game design. The gloves were an orange pair on Nike Vapor Grip 3's, as shown in the photo, with black latex which had been provided by Nike, but following the arrival Courtois sent them off to be painted by a designer before wearing them in training in 2015. Courtois is a big fan of the free game and this was just one pair of custom gloves that he has worn in his career.
Another custom glove that Courtois received was direct from Nike, which he received following the 2018 World Cup where he won the tournaments golden glove, similar to Harry Kane who received Custom Nike Hypervenom's for winning the Golden Boot, the modified VG3 gloves featured a Gold latex backhand with black accents, with the backhand fabric also being black. The latex of these gloves were black which was synonymous to Courtois' gloves at the time.
Courtois has very simple personalisation on his gloves, which features his name 'Courtois' but has occasionally had different personalisation which also included his number 13. This is not uncommon as most goalkeepers do feature personalisation however most feature names of loved ones rather than the simple personalisation.
What are your thoughts on the Nike Vapor Grip 3?
Do you like this cut?