Yahoo News Chelsea confirm Alvaro Morata shirt number ahead of debut
New signing Alvaro Morata will wear the no.9 shirt for Chelsea after completing his club-record move from Real Madrid.
The striker takes the shirt number vacant since Radamel Falcao's disappointing loan spell from Monaco during the 2015-16 season.
Morata last wore the no.9 shirt during his two-year stint with Juventus, before taking up the no.21 shirt at Real Madrid after his buy-back clause was triggered.
Morata now follows in the footsteps of former Chelsea forwards Mateja Kezman, Hernan Crespo, Franco Di Santo and Fernando Torres.
@alvaromorata will wear the number 9️⃣ shirt! #CFCTour #CFC #Chelsea
A post shared by Chelsea FC! 🏆 (@chelseafc) on Jul 24, 2017 at 5:41am PDT
The likes of Tony Cascarino, Mark Stein, Gianluca Vialli, Chris Sutton and Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink have all also worn the shirt during the Premier League era.
Centre-back Khalid Boulahrouz and midfielder Steve Sidwell wore the sought-after shirt number for the 2006-07 and 2007-08 seasons respectively.
Morata becomes Chelsea's fourth first-team addition of the summer, following the arrivals of Willy Caballero, Antonio Rudiger and Tiemoue Bakayoko, and will make his debut against Bayern Munich on Tuesday.
