The Tekela is the first laceless silo by New Balance, going full collision course against the very best boots of adidas. Is the New Balance Tekela sub-par, on-par, or above-par than what the Stripes brand can offer? See more details below…
What You’ll Find On This Page:
- Tekela v4 Review
- New Balance in Football
- Tekela Boot Tiers
- Tekela v3+ vs v7
- Generations of Tekela Football Boots
When it comes to its football boots, New Balance is headlined by the Furon, the speed boot worn by Sadio Mane, Raheem Sterling, and Bukayo Saka. To be fair, the Tekela, generally considered as a mere support option, does offer something unique from the Furon and is worthy of consideration as a New Balance silo.
Tekela Boot Tiers
As in the case with the leading brands, New Balance offers the Tekela at multiple price points.
TEKELA PRO
The Tekela at its finest; all the best of the silo in build and form…
TEKELA MAGIA
First takedown of the Tekela line; follows along the line of the Nike Pro and adidas .2 boots
TEKELA MAGIQUE
Your budget Tekela; same takedown concept as the Nike Academy and adidas .3
New Balance in Football
- What football teams do New Balance sponsor?
Porto, Roma, and Bilbao are some of the known teams that have a technical kit partnership with New Balance. It even had Liverpool from 2012 (through its subsidiary Warrior Sports; rebranded in 2015) to 2020, before the club moved to Nike.
It is slightly more affordable than the Nike, and might partly explain why the brand is overlooked in football (and football boots for that matter).
New Balance is actually an American brand, founded in 1906 in the Boston Area. The founder, William J. Riley, was of Irish descent.
Tekela v4 Review
Five Things You’ll Want to Know:
- Priced around £190
- Regular and Wide sizing options available, just like with the Furon
- One of the few laceless silos outside the adidas + boots
- Now on its fourth generation
- Knit-based, high-cut, and nylon outsoled
Our Tekela v4 Expert Review
✔️ Pros
- With its knitted upper, stands as a viable alternative to the laceless boots from adidas
- Laceless lockdown works fine; high tensile knit covers the midfoot and extends upwards to form an ankle sleeve
- Made lighter by the fact that texture zones are limited to the medial and lateral contact points; best used to prevent the ball from sliding through your boot
- Cutting traction supported by angled outer rim blades
- Wide option available
❌ Cons
- Still needs to be marketed even more; popularity might have been affected by the misses from the Tekela V3 (not to be confused with the 3+)
- You might need to consider grip socks if shape doesn’t have a one-to-one fit with your foot, as might be the case with any laceless boot
Whether it’s just a matter of additional star endorsements or marketing, the Tekela is poised to breakout as a popular laceless boot, at least on the retail level.
Boot Rankings, Best For…
Tekela v4 vs 3+
To get it out of the way, let’s just state first that the laceless closure and knit-base identities of the Tekela 3 make their way to the v4. From there, here are some key differences:
The texture on the v4 is minimalistic, streamlined, thinned out and limited to just the lateral and medial sides, whereas the Kinetic Stitch on the 3+ essentially covers the entirety of the upper. The end result is that the new Tekela feels more connected to the ball as opposed to the slightly padded touch of the preceding Tekela generation. It also makes the latest Tekela feel like it has shaved off some bulk, allowing it to be more pliable.
Lockdown-wise, the v4 gains a slight advantage in securing the foot in place because of its synthetic overlay, replacing the strategic balance of stretchy and tensioned areas in the 3+’s knitted upper. The v4 also extends its high-tensile knit material upwards to form a sleeve around the ankle, raising the collar height even further.
There are also significant changes on the outsole as the v4 is now comprised of a conical stud configuration on the forefoot with smaller angled blades around the edges. This encourages the wearer to attack and cut forward a little bit more. The squarish studs with rounded corners (one of which is chipped for added penetrating sharpness) remain on the heel section. Together with a nylon plate, the v4’s outsole has that solid underfoot feeling where you might think that you are stepping on a flat surface but still get some amount of snapback.
Generations of Tekela Football Boots
The Tekela has gone through quite a number of changes despite being relatively young for a football boot silo. Take a read at the following to see how the boot transformed from one generation to the other.
Tekela 1.0 (2018)
New Balance started the Tekela in 2018 ahead of the World Cup to replace the Vizaro line. The beginning of the Tekela saw it equipped with an NB70 synthetic upper with the first iteration of the Kinetic Stitch texturing. It had a high-cut neoprene collar that also comprised the extended tongue piece. The lacing system was noticeably shallow.
Furon 2.0 (2019)
A year later, New Balance updated the Tekela by shortening the tongue and deepening the lacing system. Together with the fully-bonded no-sew seam technology towards the tongue and collar, the deeper lacing system helped improved the fit and lockdown of the Tekela in v2.
Furon 3.0 (2020)
With the v3 in 2020, the New Balance Tekela turned into a laceless, knitted football boot for the first time. The Kinetic Stitch texturing transitioned away from its curved webbing design and towards a branch-like aesthetic that still covered much of the upper. The v3 finished off with a high-cut collar.
Furon 3+ (2021)
New Balance was right not to name this release the v4 in 2021, considering that the only changes applied were the form of the Kinetic Stitch (which still looked similar to the v3’s, to be honest), the slight lowering of the collar height, and the reengineering on the knitted upper itself to make it more pliable and comfortable. The 3+ was the last Tekela generation to use the stud configuration implemented by the v1.
