The Worst Kit Numbers of All Time - Goalkeepers
I love football, and my favourite things about the sport are the little quirks: the traditions, the oddities, and the superstitions.
Legendary Italian manager Arrigo Sacchi once said “Football is the most important of the least important things in life” - and of all the unimportant things within football itself, kit numbers are surely the most important.
The history of why certain positions are “supposed” to have certain numbers is as long as it is interesting, and the little traditions that pop up within clubs due to iconic players having worn a specific number is beautiful.
There’s something romantic about certain numbers at certain clubs: Argentina’s and France’s number 10, Cruijff’s number 14, Atlético Madrid’s same number being carried by Diego Simeone and Gabi, and, perhaps most famously, Manchester United’s number 7 being worn by legendary players like Cristiano Ronaldo, David Beckham, Eric Cantona, George Best and Denis Law. It is probably the closest thing football has to a sacred number that hasn’t been retired.
The numbers in today’s article, on the other hand, break with the traditions and established aesthetics of the sport. Some are truly cursed, some are weird and silly, and some are endearing in their own way.
For full disclosure, I have a slight preference for Spain’s system of only allowing first team members to wear numbers up to 25, with number 1 and 13 reserved for goalkeepers. In general, I dislike the chaotic hellscape of Serie A’s kit numbers, and I hate players using their birth year as a kit number.
Without further ado...
Cursed Kit Numbers: Goalkeepers
The unwritten rules for goalkeepers are simple and clear: as the first player on the team sheet, they should wear number 1. Number 13 is also used for goalkeepers in many countries; traditionally it has been reserved for the back-up goalkeeper, though plenty of starting keepers have worn the number in recent years. See La Liga’s Jan Oblak and Thibaut Courtois wearing number 13 for Atlético Madrid and Real Madrid, respectively.
Other than number 1 and number 13, goalkeepers are fairly free to choose what they like. There aren’t many traditional numbers for their position, but some people still manage to make entirely wrong choices… For example:
Emiliano Viviano
Number 2.
Clubs: Sampdoria, SPAL and Fatih Karagümrük.
Part of the not-so-golden Italian generation that came into maturity following the country’s 2006 World Cup win, Emiliano Viviano represented his nation in the 2008 Beijing Olympics, reaching - and being sent off in - the quarter finals. He would represent fine teams like Brescia, Bologna, Palermo, Fiorentina and Arsenal before things took a turn for the worse ahead of the 2014/15 season.
To clarify: sporting wise, everything went very well. Sampdoria finished in 7th place and qualified for the Europa league in their second season back in Serie A. But Emiliano made the shocking decision of choosing #2 as his kit number.
Not only is this quite possibly the single most offensive kit number for a goalkeeper ever, but Viviano was the number one choice in goal for Sampdoria, not number two. It’s not like he was strapped for choice either. He could have chosen any of the following numbers:
13
15
16
24
27
28
30
…and 66 of the remaining numbers up to 99
Viviano played four seasons for Sampdoria with #2 on his back before joining Sporting in a deal worth €2 million ahead of the 2018/19 season, where he promptly took kit number 1 as the third choice goalkeeper. Failing to make any appearances in the first half of the season, he joined Italian SPAL in a January loan move.
Back on home soil, Viviano was up to his old antics and took the number 2 kit. Is it a mitigating circumstance that he was now the number two goalkeeper? Or does it make it worse that he chose #2 twice?
If your opinion aligns with the latter, I have bad news for you.
Sporting failed to offload Viviano after he finished his loan move at SPAL, and he was released by the club in September 2019. He would finally find a new club a full 11 months later: Fatih Karagümrük in Turkey’s Süper Lig.
Yeah, you guessed it, he chose #2 again. For his third club, for his sixth season, despite Fatih Karagümrük’s number 1 shirt being available for the taking. Truly shameful.
Guillermo Ochoa
Number 6.
Club: CF América.
Perhaps best known for his heroics for the Mexican national team, Ochoa has represented his country 111 times so far and taken part in a long list of international tournaments for El Tri:
The FIFA World Cup in 2006, 2010, 2014, and 2018
The Copa América in 2007 and the 2016 Copa América Centenario
The CONCACAF Gold Cup in 2007, 2009, 2015 and 2019
The FIFA Confederations Cup in 2013 and 2017
The 2004 Summer Olympics
He was also originally due to represent Mexico in the 2011 CONCACAF Gold Cup, but was unable to compete due to a doping suspension after testing positive for the performance-enhancing drug Clenbuterol. The World Anti-Doping Agency ended up dropping the case in October 2011, three and a half months after Mexico won the Gold Cup sans Ochoa.
Readers may remember “Memo” Ochoa from his incredible game against Brazil in the 2014 World Cup. Technically clubless after his contract with AC Ajaccio had expired, Ochoa single-handedly kept a mediocre Mexico alive, kept Brazil to a draw and gave one of the best individual performances in the World Cup.
His showing at the World Cup secured Ochoa a contract with Málaga in La Liga. After bouncing around in Europe for a while, Memo is now back in his childhood club América, and he decided to make a mockery of the game in his first season back.
Upon his arrival at the club for the 2018/19 season, Agustín Marchesín (now at FC Porto) occupied the number 1 jersey, but América had just freed up number 13 by selling their previous backup goalkeeper. Ochoa was having none of that. Instead, he picked number 6 and forced central defender Emanuel Aguilera to move to number 19 instead.
Worse, when the 2019/20 season rolled around, Ochoa switched to the more traditional #13 before swapping back to #6 during the season, then switching to #13 for the 2020/21 season.
Worst of all? It wasn’t his first offense.
Guillermo Ochoa
Number 8.
Club: Standard Liège.
Ochoa found himself in a difficult position after joining Málaga in 2014. Despite having an incredible World Cup showing, he found himself behind the indomitable Carlos Kameni in the pecking order. The Cameroonian keeper had been playing in La Liga for a decade and was considered a very strong goalkeeper, and he would prove hard to displace.
Ochoa made just six appearances in his first Spanish season, all of them coming in the Copa del Rey. The 2015/16 season was somewhat more fruitful for the Mexican; he made a total of 13 appearances, mostly due to Kameni getting injured late in the season.
The 2016/17 season was spent on loan at a truly woeful Grenada side. Ochoa did finally get the playing time he was looking for, but the team was doomed from the start. Grenada set a new record in the league when they conceded 82 league goals: an average of 2.15 goals per game. Guillermo Ochoa played all 38 league games.
It says a lot about his quality as a goalkeeper that Ochoa also made the most saves across the top 5 European leagues. The Grenada defence was about as sturdy as wet toilet paper, and it could have been much worse than 82 league goals conceded without Memo between the sticks.
Though only 32 years old, Guillermo Ochoa took a - no offense intended - big step down and joined Belgian club Standard Liège ahead of the 2017/18 season, grabbing the number 8 kit. Why? Take away the A from the end of Ochoa, and you have Ocho - Spanish for eight. I mean, it’s kind of cute and fun. But for a goalkeeper? No thanks. Not for me.
Rui Patrício
Number 11.
Club: Wolverhampton Wanderers.
Patrício, who (understandably) left Sporting Clube de Portugal following the infamous incident where Sporting supporters invaded the club’s training ground to attack players and staff, has simultaneously the most infuriating and understandable shirt number on this list.
Eyebrows were immediately raised when Wolves announced their numbers for the upcoming 2018/19 season: their new star goalkeeper had chosen number 11. The #1 jersey was available following Carl Ikeme’s retirement that summer, but that was also the reason Patrício chose not to take the number.
Ikeme’s wasn’t your run-of-the-mill retirement: he was only 32 years old and had just finished a year of intense chemotherapy following an acute leukaemia diagnosis in July 2017. Furthermore, Ikeme had been a Wolverhampton player from 2004 to 2018, featuring for the club in eight of those seasons and representing Wolves in League One, the EFL Championship and Premier League along the way.
The Portuguese shot stopper opted against taking the number to honour Ikeme. A fantastic gesture. But, uh… Number 11? Patrício could have taken number 12, 13, 20, 22, and a number of others. Patrício is currently in his third season with the West Midlands club and is still wearing number 11.
As an interesting side note, I should mention the wonderful coordination of Wolves’ goalkeepers ahead of the 18/19 season:
11: first choice goalkeeper Rui Patrício
21: second choice goalkeeper John Ruddy
31: third choice goalkeeper Will Norris
Lovely.
Bartłomiej Drągowski
Number 69.
Clubs: Jagiellonia Białystok, Fiorentina and Empoli.
Dragowski was once considered one of the biggest goalkeeping talents in Europe. While you could argue that he hasn’t quite reached the lofty heights most thought he would, he has still established himself as a first choice goalkeeper for a club in a top 5 league, which is impressive.
He has also represented his native Poland on one occasion, albeit in a 2020 friendly against Finland. He is unfortunate that Poland has an incredible generation of goalkeepers ahead of him: Łukasz Fabiański (West Ham), Wojciech Szczęsny (Juventus), and Łukasz Skorupski (Bologna). The country is truly spoilt for choice between the sticks, but they are 35, 30 and 29 years old respectively, and Drągowski is only 23.
He will have his day in the sun. What he seems intent on not having, is a normal kit number.
Already wearing number 69 on his professional debut for Jagiellonia Białystok, his local top side in Poland, it has become something of a brand for Drągowski. Granted, he did take number 97 when he joined AFC Fiorentina in 2016. Perhaps that was so that he could pretend to be normal until he knew everybody well, because he switched to number 69 two seasons later.
He’s somehow brought himself to wear #69 for the last three seasons, including one on loan at Empoli. Absolutely horrific stuff.
Gianluigi Buffon
Number 77.
Club: Juventus F.C.
Gianluigi Buffon is pretty much the definition of a living legend. Widely considered to be one of the best goalkeepers of all time (if not the best), he has a list of accolades that will make almost any footballer blush. Most Serie A appearances, most appearances for the Italian national team (by a margin of 40 caps), 10 Serie A titles, one Serie B title, one Ligue 1 trophy, 13 cup wins including super cups, a UEFA Cup win with a legendary Parma side and the Holy Grail for all footballers: a World Cup.
That said, he has made some odd choices in his career.
Buffon had long since cemented himself as a Juventus legend by the end of the 2017/18 season. After 17 straight seasons with the club - including a quick dip into Serie B following the Calciopoli match fixing scandal, he was 40 years old and his contract was expiring, so you couldn't blame most people for anticipating that his retirement was imminent. Buffon, however, had different plans.
Desperately chasing a Champions League victory, the one club football trophy that has eluded him his whole career, Buffon signed a one-year contract with Paris Saint-Germain with an option of a second year. In Paris, Buffon shared playing time with homegrown goalkeeper Alphonse Areola, who ended up featuring more often for Les Parisiens that season than Buffon did.
The Champions League trophy once again proved to be out of reach for Gianluigi Buffon as PSG were eliminated by Marcus Rashford’s last second penalty in the round of 16. Surely he would retire now; a 41 years old with a failed foreign adventure behind him and an expiring contract?
No.
When Buffon came crawling back to Turin and Juventus, his old position and kit number had been taken by the aforementioned Wojciech Szczęsny. The Polish goalkeeper offered to return the number 1 shirt, and newly-appointed captain Giorgio Chiellini offered for Buffon to resume his captaincy of Juventus. Buffon gracefully declined both, making the following statement:
I thank Szczęsny and Chiellini for offering me, respectively, the number 1 and the captain’s armband, but I didn’t come back to take something from someone or take it back. I just want to do my bit for the team. It’s only right that the starting goalkeeper, Szczęsny, has the No 1 jersey. And for the captaincy we have a great player like Giorgio Chiellini.
...and that is why he has ended up in this article. Buffon ended up taking number 77, which, first of all, is an awful number, and, secondly, Buffon is born in 1978, so he can’t even blame it on doing something “cutesy” like choosing his birth year as his kit number. Which I also hate, but we’ll touch on that a bit later…
So why did he choose 77? Speaking to Sky Italia, Buffon stated that “I’ve thought about number 77. It represents my history. I had this number at Parma and it brought me luck. I really like it.”
Yeah… Let’s take a closer look at Buffon at Parma.
Gianluigi Buffon
Number 88.
Club: Parma F.C.
Parma is about as volatile a club as we’ve seen in the last 30 years of professional football. They won eight trophies between 1992 and 2002, went bankrupt and were in controlled administration from 2003 to 2007, were declared bankrupt again in 2015 and restarted as a new club in Italy’s fourth tier, and have since returned to Serie A through three consecutive promotions. Quite a rollercoaster.
Parma was a powerhouse in the late 90s, which just so happened to coincide with the rise of a once-in-a-generation goalkeeping talent: Gianluigi Buffon.
Gigi, as he was nicknamed, would train with the Parma first team at just 16 and go on to make his Serie A debut at 17 years old near the end of 1995, keeping a clean sheet in a draw against eventual league champions AC Milan. This is all pretty crazy considering the strength of both Parma, AC Milan, and the Italian league at the time.
It would be worth discussing Buffon’s incredible performances as a young goalkeeper, but this article isn’t really about great players. So let’s take a look at Gigi’s kit numbers for Parma.
1995/96: Number 12
1996/97: Number 12
1997/98: Number 28
1997/98: Number 1
1998/99: Number 1
1999/00: Number 1
2000/01: Number 77
2001/02: Number 1 (after transferring to Juventus)
Right off the bat, there are some odd choices here. Number 12 is a good selection for a second choice keeper, but why would he move to number 28 after establishing himself as the first choice goalkeeper? Furthermore, why would he then swap to number 1 during the season?
Regardless, Buffon’s real controversy begins at the start of the new millennium. At the start of the new season, Gigi had chosen number 88 as his kit number. For the blissfully unaware, 88 is often used as a Neo-Nazi code for “Heil Hitler”, as H is the 8th letter of the alphabet. It is considered a hate symbol by many.
"I have chosen 88 because it reminds me of four balls and in Italy we all know what it means to have balls: strength and determination," Buffon said. Predictably, the young superstar faced fierce backlash.
While Buffon was busy defending his decision to wear a kit number that appeared to refer to Neo-Nazism, Parma's director of football Michele Uva came out in support of the Italian. "The Jewish community should deal with more serious matters”, Uva protested, as if the normalisation of Neo-Nazism and antisemitism wouldn’t be of utmost concern for Jewish people, and implying that only jews could possibly oppose such disgusting ideologies.
In the end, Buffon ended up buckling under the mounting public pressure, stating that he "didn't know the hidden meaning of 88", which is somewhat hard to fathom when his grandparents would have lived through fascist Italy under Mussolini. Buffon did not end up playing any official games wearing number 88, but it remains a black mark on his character to this day. He would change his shirt number to 77, and chose number 1 when joining Juventus in the summer of 2001.
Isn’t it a bit odd for Buffon to claim a great nostalgia for the number 77 shirt almost 20 years later when it was worn for a single season?
“ [Number 77] represents my history. I had this number at Parma and it brought me luck. I really like it.”
While picking number 88 could be seen as a simple mistake, there is further context here. Buffon had previously worn a shirt featuring the Italian fascist slogan "Boia chi molla" which roughly translates to "Death to those who surrender", and the slogan was used by fascists under Mussolini's regime. Buffon again claimed to be unaware of the phrase’s far-right history which… I don’t know about you, but it sets off some major déjà vu for me.
Left: Common depictions of fascist symbolism with the “Bioa Chi Molla” slogan.
Right: Gianluigi Buffon with the “Bioa Chi Molla” slogan written on his kit in permanent marker.
Yikes.
Gianluigi Donnarumma
Number 99.
Club: AC Milan.
“Gigio” Donnarumma has been one of the highest regarded goalkeepers in the game for almost six years - and he’s still just 22 years old.
He made his Serie A debut at just 16 years and 242 days in the autumn of 2015, becoming the second-youngest goalkeeper to start a match in the history of Italian football. Diego López, his competitor for the goalkeeping position, was quick to praise the teenager, describing Donnarumma as "the future of Milan and of Italian football" after the game.
His meteoric rise to the game’s upper echelons has coincided with both AC Milan’s and Italy’s resurgence, and Gigio has locked down the starting position for both sides, just like Diego López predicted. He’s made more than 250 senior appearances for Milan and kept around 90 clean sheets at the time of writing. His international career even overlapped with his childhood hero and namesake Gianluigi Buffon for two years - despite Donnarumma being born three years after Buffon made his professional debut.
Now stamped with a market value of € 60 million, Gianluigi Donnarumma’s contract - just his second professional contract - is due to expire at the end of June 2021, and he will be able to leave AC Milan for free, should he choose to do so. Juventus is predictably said to be sniffing around, and with Donnarumma represented by notorious agent Mino Raiola, anything can happen.
Gigio has played with number 1 and 22 in Rossoneri youth teams, but has only worn number 99 in his (short) professional career. As you probably guessed, he was born in 1999. His big brother Antonio was born in 1990 and wears number 90. How boring.
Antonio Donnarumma joined AC Milan in 2005, 8 years before his brother took the trip up north, and is currently the club’s third choice goalkeeper. He was never able to take the giant leaps that his baby brother has taken, but has made a number of appearances in Serie B and the Greek Super League on loan.
99 doesn’t feel as shocking as 77 or 88 to me, but it’s still pretty bad. Honestly, I couldn’t resist the opportunity to line those three numbers up towards the end of the article.
Dishonourable mentions
It is hard to describe Jorge Campos (pictured above) without using words like eccentric or unconventional, but it’s important to note that Campos was a great footballer, a true character and an icon of the game above all else.
Jorge Campos played as a striker through his youth, but came through the Mexican side UNAM Pumas academy as a goalkeeper. Finding himself lacking in playing time didn’t sit well with “El Brody”, who asked for game time as a striker instead.
Scoring 14 goals in his debut season, Jorge Campos was actually close to becoming the top scorer of Liga MX. He took his place as starting goalkeeper after two years as a striker, and Pumas immediately won the league. El Brody would score 28 goals in the 205 games he played in his first stint for Pumas; not a bad return for someone who was a starting goalkeeper for five of those seven years.
Naturally, Campos’ ability to switch positions from one end of the field to the other has led to some funny scenarios, purely number-wise: he has played as a striker wearing number 1 and has obviously played goalie with number 9 on his jersey as well.
Despite standing at just 168 (5’6”) cm in a position with an average height of 190 cm (6’3”), Campos was a surprisingly good goalkeeper who made up for what he lacked in height with lightning quick reflexes, incredible jumping reach and heaps of agility. His unique skill set made him a sort of prototype for the modern sweeper keeper; able to pick the ball out of the air, drop it to his feet and either make accurate passes or carry the ball upfield himself.
He’s regarded as Mexico's best goalkeeper of all time, and has the highlights reel to back it up. The diminutive Mexican is also fondly remembered for his colourful jerseys, which he designed himself.
Back to Italy, then. Cristiano Lupatelli is the only goalkeeper to wear number 10 that I’ve come across, having worn it while playing for Chievo during the 2001/02 and 2002/03 seasons. He explained his choice in a 2009 interview with Italian goalkeeping website Il Numero 1:
Interviewer: In the first year of Chievo you wore the number 10 shirt. Was it because you were the best with your feet?! Are you aware that you may be the only goalkeeper to wear the same number as Maradona, Pele and Zidane? Tell us how it happened.
Cristiano Lupatelli: A bet with friends. It all started as a joke, and it became a reality. I think it is a funny and nice thing.
I strongly disagree with that one, Cristiano. His kit number history is truly the second most cursed thing I’ve come across while writing this article. Through his 18 year playing career, he changed his number between seasons 14 times. Transfermarkt also claims that he wore number 3 for Roma directly after his Chievo stint, but I haven’t been able to verify this through pictures.
The only thing more cursed than Lupatelli’s kit numbers is his signature hairstyle: shaved head with sideburn and a goatee. Speaking in the same interview with Il Numero 1, Lupatelli said “Unfortunately the hair has abandoned me! The sideburns and the goatee are the only glories of hair I have left, and so I show them!”, which is honestly fair enough.
Angelo Peruzzi, who won the 2006 World Cup with Italy and was replaced by Gianluigi Buffon at Juventus in the early 2000s wore kit number 70 for three seasons with Lazio. Obviously he was born in 1970. Boo.
Ederson - the Manchester City goalkeeper - wore number 93 for three seasons with Rio Ave in Portugal. Predictably, he too was born in 1993. Boring. He is making up for it by wearing number 31 for Manchester City, and has done so for four seasons, which is a cool number for a starting goalkeeper: a mirrored image of number 13 for a player who is a mirrored image of a traditional goalie.
7 out of the 12 players discussed in this article played in Italy, and I hope that brings some further context to what I called “the chaotic hellscape of Serie A’s kit numbers” in the introduction.
