A sweatband is the cheapest functional item most clubs buy, and the one most often bought on colour alone. Four questions fix that.

Ask for loop density and pile height

Capacity is a physical volume of terry. Nothing else predicts it.

If the supplier cannot state them, they have not specified them.

Ask for stretch recovery after washing

Bands relax, and a relaxed band migrates down the arm.

Stretch when new tells you nothing about month six.

Match the width to the job

Wrist width, double-wide for long matches, brow width for foreheads.

A headband needs its own tension, not a scaled-up wrist figure.

Insist on a knitted-in mark

Jacquard stretches with the band and cannot peel.

Embroidery needs backing, and backing is what makes a band pucker.

Then choose the colour

Club colours, national colours, cause colours — safely secondary to all four.