Association Football
In association football, numbers were traditionally assigned based on a player's position or reputation on the field, with the starting 11 players wearing 1–11, and the substitutes wearing higher numbers. The goalkeeper would generally wear number 1, then defenders, midfield players and forwards in ascending order.
Numbers being assigned to each player in a squad was initiated for the 1954 World Cup, where each man in a country's 22-man squad wore a specific number for the duration of the tournament. In 1993, England's Football Association switched to persistent squad numbers, abandoning the mandatory use of 1–11 for the starting line-up. It became standard in the FA Premier League in the 1993–94 season, with names printed above the numbers. Most European top leagues adopted the system over the next five years.
Very high numbers, the most common being 88, are often reserved and used as a placeholder, when a new player has been signed and played by the manager prior to having a formal squad number.
Read more about this topic: Number (sports)
Famous quotes containing the words association and/or football:
“... a Christian has neither more nor less rights in our association than an atheist. When our platform becomes too narrow for people of all creeds and of no creeds, I myself cannot stand upon it.”
—Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906)
“In this dream that dogs me I am part
Of a silent crowd walking under a wall,
Leaving a football match, perhaps, or a pit,
All moving the same way.”
—Philip Larkin (1922–1986)