While No 9s still score the most goals and No 1s try to stop them, trends have changed since the introduction of squad numbers in the early 1990s
How much is a shirt number worth? It costs £8 if you want two digits added to the back of Arsenal’s 2026-27 home shirt, whereas Manchester City add on £16 for customisation, whether you want a name as well as a number or not.
That is cheap compared to what baseball players decide among themselves. Juan Soto bought Brett Baty a $92,000 (£69,000) car in exchange for getting his preferred number (22) when he joined the New York Mets last year. But that’s baseball, where they allow players to wear ‘0’. Anything goes.