The Number 7
Does it really mean anything anymore?
The popular history that Manchester United insist upon pushing tells us that it was George Best who started the tradition of superstars wearing 7 at United, a lineage that’s taken in so many major names in the club’s history like Bryan Robson, Eric Cantona, David Beckham, Cristiano Ronaldo, Ella Toone, and, now, they hope, Mason Mount.
George Best played 470 games for Manchester United. Once – against Sheffield Wednesday in March 1969 – he donned the number 9 shirt. He wore number 10 on 39 occasions and had 8 on his back 43 times. In a total of 141 games, he was number 7, including the 1968 European Cup final win against Benfica, which has served to solidify the perception that it was ‘his’ number. And yet, in 246 of Best’s Manchester United games – more than half – he wore number 11. In his final six seasons with the club, he appeared as number 7 only 32 times and also wore 11 in his time in the NASL.
While, nowadays, much significance is attached to the shirt and its wearer, this is a relatively recent phenomenon and Best’s inclusion in the Manchester United pantheon is something of a retcon. He wore it sometimes, but generally when he played on the right wing, the position traditionally associated with it. The ’68 win, and his performance in that game, tends to elevate his association with it. In a feature on numbers in FourFourTwo in 2012, the editor of the fanzine United We Stand, and star of The Athletic’s Talk of the Devil’s podcast, Andy Mitten, gave his thoughts on the shirt:
“The 7 wasn’t a big thing at United until Cantona. After all, Ralph Milne wore 7. Cantona was when the press started to make a big deal about the significance. United were happy for them to do that because it added to the legend, it was something else to market.”
One of Best’s successors on the right wing was Steve Coppell, who joined United in 1975 and won 42 England caps, but he generally isn’t included in the ‘star’ bracket. Coppell wore #7 until 1981, and wore it against Tottenham in the League Cup early in 1981-82, when Bryan Robson, newly signed from West Bromwich Albion, wore 11. Coppell missed the next match, against Manchester City in the league, and Robson first wore the shirt with which he would become linked. Not because of any notion that he was carrying on Best’s mantle, though. He wrote in his autobiography:
“At West Brom, especially during Johnny Giles’ management, I played in several positions and had a variety of numbers on my back. That didn’t particularly bother me because I just wanted to play as often as possible. Then it occurred to me that my better performances came when I wore the no. 7 shirt and I came to regard it as my lucky number.
So, when I joined United, I asked if anybody minded my having the number. Steve Coppell, who usually took that number, wasn’t in the starting line-up against City and said he didn’t have a problem with my wish, anyway.
None of the lads objected either so the no. 7 shirt was mine.”
In the late 1980s and early 90s, with Robson often dogged with multiple injuries, the number was donned by a motley crew of players, both iconic and very forgetful.
Peter Davenport, Ray Wilkins, Remi Moses, Paul McGrath, Russell Beardsmore, Clayton Blackmore, Mike Duxbury, Lee Sharpe, Paul Ince, Neil Webb, Mal Donaghy, Gordon Strachan and Andrei Kanchelskis. Plenty you’d recognise, plenty you wouldn’t, and plenty you’d say “How did he get to wear the 7”, about.
When fit, Captain Marvel, as he was coined by the Old Trafford faithful, would always wear it but the signing of Eric Cantona in November 1992 changed things. Cantona’s first match was in a friendly against Benfica, when he wore #10, and then his league debut was as a sub against Manchester City in early December.
When he made his first start, it was as a direct replacement for Robson, with number 9 Brian McClair dropping back into midfield. With Cantona playing a key role, United powered up the table, eventually winning the title. Robson’s only other start that season would be in the final game against Wimbledon, when Cantona wore 11. Squad number were introduced for the 1993-94 season, though, and it was Cantona who was assigned #7 with Robson now #12. In his book, Robson revealed that it wasn’t a problem, seemingly ignoring the ‘luck’ reasoning:
“I didn’t even mind losing the no. 7 shirt to Eric. I knew I would be used a lot as a sub in the 1993-94 season and Eric had already shown his value to the club. We’d won the league in his first season with us and it was obvious he was going to be an important player for quite some time.
He’d always liked to wear the no. 7 so, that summer, when the boss was working out his squad numbers for the new season, I told him I didn’t mind having a different number. I’d had a great World Cup in 1982 wearing 16, so it wasn’t a problem having 12, 14 or any other number. I was, after all, now a bit-part player for United.”
But Robson’s assertion that Cantona always preferred to wear #7 is questionable. With Leeds in 1991-92, he only made six starts, wearing number 9 once and, strangely, number 3 once and number 2 on three occasions. Even odder – given that squad numbers were at the time only a major-finals delicacy – in the final game of the season, he wore #14 when playing from the start against Norwich City while Gordon Strachan was sub but still had #7.
Incidentally, Robson did play in all four of United’s Champions League games in 1993-94. Teams lined out in 1-11 in Europe until the end of 1995-96 and in those games, two against Kispest Honved and two against Galatasaray, Cantona wore #9 to accommodate the captain, who left at the end of that season to take over as player-manager of Middlesbrough.
Cantona would retain #7 until his retirement after the 1996-97 season, a season in which David Beckham had worn #10.
Teddy Sheringham arrived from Tottenham and sought to wear 10, which resulted in Beckham very reluctantly taking 7. This article takes the view that he always wanted it, while a passage in Roy Keane’s second autobiography also promotes that view. This seems to be another case of time shaping opinion. If Beckham did love 7, he didn’t fight hard to wear it. For the 1992 FA Youth Cup final, he wore 6 and in the following year’s decider he had 8 on his back. In 1995-96, United wore 1-11 in games in both the Coca-Cola Cup and FA Cup and Beckham wore both 8 and 10.
Beckham’s 2003 autobiography My Side tells of how he learned he was to become United’s new number 7:
“When I first got into United’s first team as a regular, my squad number was 24. The following season I was given the number 10 shirt. That meant a great deal to me: Denis Law and Mark Hughes had both worn it before me.
“Maybe the history that went with the number was why I scored so many goals wearing it. I remember, though, the summer we signed Teddy Sheringham, the boss actually took the trouble to phone me when I was away on holiday in Malta to tell me he was taking that squad number off me. No explanation, no alternative and no argument. I remember saying to Gary Neville at the time: ‘What’s he done that for? Why would he phone to tell me that? Did he just want to make sure he ruined my holiday?’
“I was devastated, trying to work out what I’d done wrong. Then, a month later when we turned up for pre-season training, he had a new shirt ready: the number 7. The boss handed me Eric Cantona’s squad number. The surprise of that honour stopped me in my tracks.”
Beckham also explains how he felt about being given the number 7 shirt in a special ad United made with Adidas last season:
When Beckham departed for Real Madrid in 2003, Alex Ferguson decreed that new signing Cristiano Ronaldo should wear #7, despite the Portuguese teenager’s initial preference for the 28 he had worn at Sporting Lisbon. That Ronaldo now owns the trademark CR7 shows just how much he took to it..
Ronaldo’s success in the number 7 shirt helped to continue the narrative of 7 being the number at Old Trafford, but his successors most definitely have not.
The next man up was Michael Owen. Barring his iconic Fergie time goal in the 2009 Manchester derby, and a hat-trick in the Champions League group stage vs Wolfsburg, he was far from a fitting successor to the most expensive player in the world at the time. 52 Appearances, 17 goals. Not great.
After he left, Antonio Valencia switched from 25 to 7 for 2012-13, Sir Alex Ferguson’s final season. After a fine 2011-12, when he was named the club’s player of the season after contributing 14 assists in total and proving to be a menace out wide, he then endured a 2012-13 that was so unproductive he decided to revert back to 25, believing that a return would help him regain his form. This was for the best, as Valencia became a right back for his remaining time at the club, and regained his form in a major way.
Next came Angel Di Maria, who was forced to take the number.
“When I arrived, I saw that the No 11 was available, it’s a shirt number I wore a lot when I was younger and I was keen to get once again. At Real Madrid, No 11 was already taken, so I took 22. At Manchester United, they gave me No 7. I didn’t get a choice. I would have liked 11 but there we are. Here (then at Paris Saint-Germain), I had a choice, so I chose 11!”
Some would have you believe that Di Maria was a flop at United. Facts are, he scored 4 goals and had 12 assists during his 32 game tenure, including 3 goals and 4 assists in his first 6 games. He was not properly utilised as he was played out of his best position regularly. After a month on the sidelines from a December hamstring injury and a February burglary on his home in the Cheshire countryside, Di Maria’s form dropped off massively, partially because he was struggling with the demands of a coach who clearly didn’t appreciate his talents, and partially because said coach refused to play him consistently enough in his best position for him to try and regain some form.
Di Maria was moved on acrimoniously at the end of that season, and young new signing Memphis Depay took up the mantle. He had moments, but they were few and far between. 7 goals and 6 assists through 53 appearances. It was clear he had potential, he just couldn’t live up to it on such a big stage at this early point in his career. He recognised that himself. Memphis wrote in his recent book:
“I lost myself in Manchester. It took me a few years to realise that. During my time in Manchester I blamed everybody: Van Gaal, Mourinho, I felt like the whole world was against me. But I didn’t blame myself. That’s not how it works in life.”
”Now I know what the real problem was: not only I lost myself, I also neglected my belief in God. That was the real reason why I felt so alone in Manchester. You won’t make it when you have to deal with your problems on your own.”
“My performances at United were not even close to what I am capable of. I was looking for excuses to justify the failure. I hid myself behind the fact that it was my first adventure abroad, that I had to adapt to the high level of the Premier League.”
For Memphis, it was all too much, too soon. He’d performed wonderfully at PSV but this was a step too early in his journey. It didn’t help that the media insisted upon calling him by his surname in interviews and articles, something he had expressly requested they not do after he had a falling out with his father. It was a rough time at the club for Memphis, but thankfully he has gone on to have a successful career since.
We all know the story of Alexis Sanchez’s awful reign in the 7. I’m not going to run back over that. All there is to say is that he at least actually wanted the jersey when he arrived.
Then there was a period where no one seemed to want it. Some in the media proposed that Cristiano Ronaldo had put a curse on the jersey. Juan Mata was supposedly offered it, as was Bruno Fernandes, then United signed Edinson Cavani and he happily took the number he had worn during his successful spell with Napoli. He performed well during his time in the jersey. Unfortunately he was wracked with injuries and never took to the pitch on a regular basis. But he was a spark that the number needed injected back into it. Who can forget his late winner against Southampton, or his wondergoal on the final day of the season when fans returned from Covid lockdown. It’s a shame that Cavani didn’t get enough time amongst the fans during his period at the club.
A year later, Ronaldo returned and inevitably wanted No 7. That proved an issue, because Cavani had already worn that shirt this season, and players aren’t generally allowed to change numbers midway through a campaign, but United were provided special dispensation. This, unfortunately, soured the club’s relationship with Cavani, who enjoyed a couple of trips back home to Uruguay during his final season rather than showing up to perform for the club that was paying him.
The Ronaldo return was magical. But it was also horrible. In his only full season, Ronaldo would regularly save United from dire situations. Late winners against Atalanta and Villareal saved the team’s Champions League campaign. Hat-tricks against Spurs and Norwich (I was at that one). It was thrilling to watch at times. But his presence also clearly hindered United.
This team that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer had built to terrorise teams on the counter-attack now had a huge Ronaldo shaped stopgap at Striker. He was still a player who insisted he was able to create his own goal opportunities from nothing. He couldn’t manage to deal with the fact that his pace and on-ball ability had declined. He slowed down nearly every attack, and limited United’s chances, as well as the progression of young players like Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford. The vast majority were delighted to see him demoted to the bench by Erik ten Hag at the beginning of last season, and his decision to go AWOL on multiple occasions only further reinforced that decision. His parting with the club was for the best.
The point of all this looking back comes to something Cristiano Ronaldo says in the video I linked earlier on:
“All players know, in Manchester and around the world as well that number 7 is a mythic number in this club”.
That’s exactly what this all is. A myth. A legend. A story.
But stories hold power.
Best wore the #11 more than he wore the #7. But in the 1968 European Cup Final, when he rounded José Henriqué in front of Wembley and the rest of the world, he wore the #7 on his back.
Robson wore a variety of different jerseys throughout his time at United. But when Captain Marvel collected the ball in the middle of the Liverpool midfield, dashed forward and hammered a blistering shot into the top corner past Grobelaar in 1985, he did it with the #7 on his back.
Cantona wore a few different numbers in his first couple of years at United. But when The King flicked up his collar, spun out of the Sunderland midfield, played a one-two with Brian McClair, and chipped the ball over the keeper, off the intersection of the post and crossbar and in, he did it with the #7 on his back.
The Football Association (The FA) switched to persistent squad numbers, abandoning the mandatory use of 1–11 for the starting line-up in 1993, and it only became standard in English Football the following season, along with names being printed above the numbers.
It’s only since the time of Cantona that players really had a choice in making the #7 iconic. The stories we tell about these players last throughout the ages. I haven’t even brought up the free-kicks of Beckham and Ronaldo, or Toone’s rocket against Everton.
Ultimately, the jersey doesn’t make the player. The player makes the jersey. The #7 would be meaningless without the players that have played in it. But the stories we’ve seen unfold through the wearers of this jersey mean that it still holds a certain aura.
Despite a long dearth of brilliance from the jersey, it emanates a magical feeling. At their core, stories establish connections with us. They incite emotions by putting us in the perspective of the characters we see these stories told about. They establish familiarity, and allow us to immerse ourselves in narratives. They’re easy to consume, and hard to forget. No matter how many duds that have worn the number on their backs over the past decade and a half, the joyful stories fans have seen play out in front of their eyes will live on much longer than any negatives.
And that brings us to the next chapter of the story. Mason Mount. An abnormal choice given the position he plays in, but maybe he’ll end up harkening back to the days of Captain Marvel. Whatever happens, whether he’s the next star to leave his legend with the number forever, or whether he’s another disastrous choice, the #7 will continue to hold the same emotions around it.
Despite the turmoil of the last decade and a half, the number 7 will always continue to be an icon representative of Manchester United’s folklore. It’s had bad runs before, and will have more in the future. But the icon will live on, no matter what. The players that have etched their name into history wearing this jersey have earned that right.
As a Manchester United fan, I hope this next page in the book of the number’s history is an enjoyable one at the very least.