Why use a design agency when we already have the Union flag?

Things you will you never hear a branding and design agency given the Team GB Olympic kit job say: – If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it – Britain has one of the most beautiful and recognisable flags in the world

– Red, white and blue – how can you possibly go wrong?

– Avoid change for change’s sake! – Patriotic feeling runs high at the Olympics, stick with traditional stuff everyone knows and loves.

None of the above entered the chia-seed porridge that passes for brains at Thisaway when it received the commission from the British Olympic Association (BOA). “We guide brands though bold change!” boasts the agency website. I bet you do. The bigger question is why the BOA thought that bold change was necessary when British athletes have always worn British colours and British symbols with pride?

Clues are to be found amid the word salad on the Thisaway website, which says: “The brand [Team GB] needed to evolve strategically and visually. To develop a clear and compelling purpose and promise that could maintain the DNA of what has made it so successful, but also resonate deeper, across multiple channels.” This is proof of my theorem: anyone using “DNA” outside the context of biology is guaranteed to be an absolute tosser (of word salad).

On and on the creatives witter, claiming the brand had to “make sure it would be fit for today’s modern, digital-first communication landscape”.

I don’t know about the digitalfirst communication landscape, but the flag they came up with is horrible. An abomination. Our beloved flag is remade in clashing swatches of orange, hot pink, blue and turquoise, like a child’s drawing of a migraine.

Everything that is perfect, strong and iconic about the Union Jack has been lost or trashed. The BOA has responded to the uproar, saying that our athletes in Paris “will wear the Union Jack as normal”. (We will see when the official kit is unveiled on April 17. I fear the worst.)

Most Brits will agree with Fatima Whitbread, our Olympic medalwinner, who said: “I’m absolutely disgusted to think they’ve done it. Let’s face it, it represents our late Queen, it represents everything that embraces what’s good about our country as years have gone by.” Spot on, Fatima.

If you read further into the Thisaway manifesto, you find that the design company even thinks there is something suspect about world-class athletic achievement.

“Elite sport, by its very nature, can be elitist,” opine the geniuses. Gosh, who would have thought it. They then claim they’ve moved the Team GB brand “away from an athlete-focussed rallying call and into an inclusive and inspirational articulation of the new purpose”.

Whatever you do, folks, don’t dwell on those astonishing men and women driving themselves 24/7 so they can represent the UK at the Olympics. Let’s pretend it’s all about slobs on the sofa thinking they can be Dina Asher-Smith.

Well, they can’t. That’s a politically-correct fiction. AsherSmith only got to be an athletics star through huge personal sacrifice combined with innate genius. As a British Olympian, she and her teammates are part of a glorious elite, not some diversity project to make lesser mortals feel good about themselves.

Young people don’t need a digital-first communication landscape or some psychedelic, Union Jack tribute act to make them proud of their country. A flag that has lifted British hearts for over 200 years, and athletes who aspire to drape themselves in red, white and blue, need no improvement.