A history of Manchester United’s shirt number 15

Manchester United welcome Leny Yoro to the club this summer, hoping the Frenchman will be the kind of smash hit Real Madrid achieved with an 18-year-old Raphael Varane.

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

Many of United’s very best signings over the years are those who have joined the club as burgeoning talents not yet at their peak – think Cristiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney and David de Gea, even dating back to Roy Keane or Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.

Less successful have been the expensively-signed established superstars like Juan Sebastian Veron, Paul Pogba, Angel Di Maria and Alexis Sanchez.

Nemanja Vidic falls into the former bracket, barely known when he arrived at the age of 24 in January 2006, and is a particular success story that Yoro might hope to emulate.

That will start by sharing a shirt number. Yoro has made his name at Lille by wearing 15 on his back, a jersey often popular with centre-backs around the world – presumably because it features a 5 in it – although oddly not United beyond Vidic. But the young Frenchman is set to take it on at Old Trafford.

United’s 15 shirt has had a varied history since fixed squad numbers came into English football in 1993.

Its very first occupant was Clayton Blackmore, a cult hero of sorts, but, having occasionally used it in previous years, he never wore it once it was permanently his due to injuries.

The famously versatile Welshman then left the club for Middlesbrough in the summer of 1994.

Next up, a teenage forward signed from Bradford City. Graeme Tomlinson. He eventually made his career at lower league and non-league level across England and made only two first-team appearances in United colours – both as a substitute in the League Cup in 1994/95.

Karel Poborsky was United’s next No.15, joining the club a month after playing for Czech Republic in the Euro ’96 final at Wembley.

Chances are he might have stayed longer than 16 months, going to Benfica in December 1997, but for anticipated trouble in securing an extended work permit that would have retained the long-haired winger into the 1998/99 treble season.

The summer of 1998 resulted in United finally landing Swedish winger Jesper Blomqvist, who had first impressed Alex Ferguson as an opposing player for Goteborg in the Champions League four years earlier.

He started the 1999 Champions League final due to an enforced midfield reshuffle, but it proved to be his final game as injury sidelined him for the next two years until his contract expired.

Luke Chadwick only made 16 of his 39 United appearances wearing 15. His shirt during a breakout season in 2000/01 had been 36, but his game time was subsequently less and less until loans at Reading and Burnley paved the way for a permanent exit to West Ham United by 2004.

United fans then had big hopes for Kleberson in 2003 due to the rave reviews he had earned during Brazil’s triumphant World Cup run 12 months earlier.

But the midfielder dislocated his shoulder in only his second appearance and was never able to fully establish himself. After 30 games, he was gone.

Nobody had heard of Nemanja Vidic, a 24-year-old from Serbia playing in Russia, when he arrived for around £7m in January 2006.

Vida spent a few months finding his feet and was then an utter colossus for almost a decade, forming a legendary partnership with Rio Ferdinand, winning five Premier League titles and the Champions League, a two-time Premier League Player of the Season, and becoming only the second non-British or Irish club captain in United’s history.

Once Vidic left in 2014, he wasn’t immediately followed and the 15 shirt lay vacant for two years until it was assigned to Adnan Januzaj.

But the Belgian never wore it before being sent on loan to Sunderland. Andreas Pereira had a similar fate the following year, moving to Valencia on a year-long deal.

But the Brazilian did return to play 62 further games, mostly under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, before further loans elsewhere. Ultimately, Pereira actually held the 15 shirt for five years in total.

Two loan signings have been the most recent occupants of United’s No.15. For a few months in 2023, Marcel Sabitzer, brought in from Bayern Munich, plugged a gap left by an injury to Christian Eriksen.

Then, in the first half of the 2023/24 season, Sergio Reguilon was recruited on loan to help out at left-back, only to be released, perhaps prematurely in hindsight, halfway through the campaign.

Yoro isn’t exactly joining a long list of legends to wear No.15 for Manchester United, but Vidic has some of the very biggest shoes to fill in modern times.

• Man Utd number 15 shirt – complete history

What we know

• Leny Yoro wore No.15 at Lille and is set to keep it at Man Utd
• French defender carries weight of expectation in £52m transfer
• New shirt has a mixed history at Old Trafford – including Nemanja Vidic.