Good correction about some of these names. But, what i liked to emphasize was another thing. My impression is, when it was played with a double spearhead (doble punta de lanza), the player with #9 shirt, or was playing in a deeper position (i.e Sindelar, Di Stefano) or he had different style of striker (i.e Tostao at WC, Coutinho). This concerning sides who played under "Danubian School", Withdraw CF (Real Madrid, Hungary, etc), 4-2-4, clasic 4-4-2, mainly. Of course there are exception, like Paulo Valentim who had a striker style of play, but i think is more the exception of the rule, than the rule itself, in the systems above mentioned.
Cruyff and Müller actually did wear the #9 shirt. Müller only wore the #13 in the 1970 World Cup because the #9 belonged to veteran striker Uwe Seeler. He then kept it as his lucky number in the 1974 World Cup. But other than these two tournaments (and the 1972 Euro semi final and final), Müller always wore the #9, both for country and club. I have seen many games in which Cruyff wore the #9 shirt. Only by the early/mid-1970s did he settle on #14 for good (which was unusual at the time as numbers above 11 were only used for reserve players - the only exception being the World Cup).
You are right. But I meant that Cruijff made himself with number #14 as trademark ... and so was number #13 with Muller. Of course, there were a lot players wearing #9: from Di Stefano ...to Eusebio .. to Van Basten ... However i was Ronaldo who made the number #9 become "main striker' or "center forward" that many got idiolized since then. For example, you ask any fans they would say #9 from Ronaldo while they might have hard time to remember Eusebio or Basten number ...
??? Number 9 has always been the central forward since the pyramid sytem. 11--10--9--8--7 -----6--5--4 ------3---2 --------1 That style of numbering is as old as numbers themselves.
Did not I mention Di Stefano wearing number 9? But when talking about #9, hardly people refer it to Great Stefano, but Ronaldo - that's the point
[I was going to mention this but you beat me to it, comme. The No.9 was also worn by the "key" or "lead the line" centre-forward in the W-M form. as well. Some star players who lined-up here in the "W-M" were Ted Drake, Tommy Lawton & Gunnar Nordahl.]
Dude ... number has ALWAYS been symbolized for being the striker's number. Ronaldo didn't set that. If a striker played with a different jersey, typically there was a reason for it (preference, history, etc ...). For example ... Romario probably wore 11 because when he started at Vasco, Roberto Dinamite (the striker) wore the 9. Then he just stuck with it. But there are plenty of strikers in Brazil who all wore the #9.
So? like i said (last time) when talking of #9 in club or Brazil NT, people refer directly to RONALDO, not so toward Tostao, Dinamite nor Careca, Adriano ... OK? Like Pele's #10, he did not ste that either ... but he made it famous! Most great strikers in England wore number 10 .. Not always NT Italian strikers wear number #9 either ... before 90 But since Ronaldo time, MOST strikers (include Italy and Egland =) start wearing #9!
Who refers to it ? You ? I've never heard of anyone saying Ronaldo 9 as they have Pele or Maradona 10.
bc you only know just a few names in football ... and you're R9 hater In such case no further discussion!
Many to list from G Hurst to Lineker, to Teddy Sherringham to Owen .. for NT For club: Jimmy Greaves, Denis Law, Mark Hughes, Teddy S, Van Nistelrroy Rooney
Dixie Dean, George Camsell, Ted Drake, Tommy Lawton, Nat Lofthouse, Jackie Milburn, Malcom MacDonald, Alan Shearer. There is a rich tradition of England's premier striker wearing the number 9 shirt.
Hurst wore the 10 because England were still numbering in a 2-3-5 despite the move to 4-4-2. Jimmy Greaves was wearing number 8 (as inside-right). Sheringham wasn't a striker. Owen wore 10 because Shearer wore 9. Greaves wore 10 or 8 because Bobby Smith wore 9. Hughes wasn't a striker, Rooney isn't a striker. Basically 9 is the classical shirt of the centre-forward in England.
Some players will have preferred 10 over 9 for a variety of reasons but if you go back to the players I listed earlier, all were centre forwards who wore number 9 for England.
Or maybe it's because I am not a Ronaldo circle-jerk nut hugger fanboy. I don't doubt there are some players who want to wear the 9 because they are fans of Ronaldo (like Benzema) ... but they are strikers. And strikers historically wear the 9. Batistuta, Careca, Evair, Dinamite, Serginho, Reinaldo, Crespo, Seeler, Altafini, etc ... all wore the 9.
Some of those are not even strikers. Maybe you know "names", but you don't clearly don't know much about them. And by the way ... Van Nistelroy ... not British.
For your info: Crespo said " wearing Ronaldo number 9 was just too heavy " (when Inter broke a big fee to bring him replacing Il Fenomeno)
It was in Germany and many other countries as well. It was actually handled pretty strict. From the 50s to the early 80s, when most clubs in Germany played with two wingers and a center forward, the numbering was almost always right wing #7, center forward #9, left wing #11. All the leading German center forwards of that era wore #9: Uwe Seeler, Gerd Müller, Klaus Fischer, Horst Hrubesch, Dieter Müller. Forwards that scored a lot of goals but weren't classic center forwards usually wore #7, #8, #10 or #11 (Allan Simonsen, Klaus Allofs, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, Bernd Hölzenbein, Uli Hoeness, Lothar Emmerich...). In the 1980s, when the two striker system emerged as dominant, one would wear the #9 the other the #11 (like for example Völler and Klinsmann; btw Klinsmann wore #18 in the 1990 World Cup because Völler had #9 and 1+8 gives 9). Club play is more telling than national team play. Shirt numbering in World Cups is far less "reliable" than shirt numbering in club play. As I pointed out before, Gerd Müller always wore the #9 for Germany and Bayern, yet people remember him wearing #13 because of the two World Cups he played in.