History of Man Utd’s No.15

Manchester United welcomed Leny Yoro to the club this summer, with the hope that the Frenchman will become the type of shock Real Madrid achieved with 18-year-old Raphael Varane.

The £52m deal highlights how convinced United are that he is destined for greatness, even as a teenager with just 60 first-team appearances under his belt.

Many of United’s best signings over the years have been those who joined the club as emerging talents who are not yet at the top level – think Cristiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney and David de Gea, and even Roy Keane or Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. Less successful were star signings like Juan Sebastian Veron, Paul Pogba, Angel Di Maria and Alexis Sanchez.

Nemanja Vidic falls into the former bracket, a relative unknown when he turned 24 in January 2006, and is something of a success story that Yoro might hope to emulate.

That will start with sharing a shirt number. Yoro made a name for himself at Lille by wearing the number 15 on his back, a jersey that is often favored by defenders around the world – perhaps because it features 5 on it – although it is rare for United to miss out on Vidic. But the young Frenchman will face him at Old Trafford.

Listen to 90 minute YouTube channel as Scott Saunders gets the lowdown on Leny Yoro from French football journalist Quentin Gesp.

United’s number 15 shirt has had a varied history since changing team numbers were introduced to English football in 1993. Its very first player was Clayton Blackmore, a cult hero of sorts, but, after using it occasionally over the years, he didn’t wear it when it became his permanent due to injury. The versatile Welshman then left the club for Middlesbrough in the summer of 1994.

Next, the young player signed from Bradford City. Graeme Tomlinson. He eventually plied his trade at lower league and non-league level across England and made only one first-team appearance for United – both as League Cup runners-up in 1994/95.

Karel Poborsky was United’s next number 15, joining the club a month after playing for the Czech Republic in the Euro ’96 final at Wembley. He may have stayed for more than 16 months, moving to Benfica in December 1997, but for the expected problem of obtaining an extended work permit that would have kept the long-haired player in the third season of 1998/99.

The summer of 1998 led to United finally acquiring the Swedish winger Jesper Blomqvist, who first impressed Alex Ferguson as Goteborg’s opposition in the Champions League four years earlier. He started the 1999 Champions League final due to a forced substitution, but it was his last game as an injury kept him out for the next two years until his contract expired.

Luke Chadwick He played 16 of 39 games for United wearing 15. His shirt off-season in 2000/01 was 36, but his game time became less and less until loan spells at Reading and Burnley paved the way for a permanent exit from West Ham. United in 2004.

United fans had high hopes Kleberson in 2003 because of the positive reviews he had earned when Brazil won the World Cup 12 months earlier. But the midfielder dislocated his shoulder in only his second appearance and was unable to fully settle down. After 30 games, he was gone.

No one had heard Nemanja Vidica 24-year-old Serbian who plays in Russia, when he arrived for around £7m in January 2006. Vida spent a few months finding his feet and was an absolute colossus for nearly a decade, forming a legendary partnership with Rio Ferdinand. , winner of five Premier League titles and the Champions League, two-time Premier League player of the season, and the only non-British or Irish team captain in United’s history.

When Vidic left in 2014, he was not immediately followed and the number 15 shirt sat empty for two years until it was allocated Adnan Januzaj. But the Belgian did not wear it before he was loaned to Sunderland. Andreas Pereira he suffered the same fate the following year, moving to Valencia on a one-year deal. But the Brazilian returned to play a further 62 games, mostly under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, before being loaned out elsewhere. In the end, Pereira actually held the 15 shirt for a total of five years.

The two players who were signed on loan were the ones who recently occupied the number 15 for United. A few months into 2023, Marcel Sabitzer, brought in from Bayern Munich, fills the void left by Christian Eriksen’s injury. Then, in the first half of the 2023/24 season, Sergio Reguilon he was recruited on loan to help at left back, but was released, perhaps prematurely in retrospect, midway through the campaign.

Yoro doesn’t quite join the long list of legends to wear the No.15 for Manchester United, but Vidic has some pretty big shoes to fill in modern times.

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