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Matthijs de Ligt to wear the no.4 shirt at Manchester United.

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Manchester United.

Matthijs de Ligt will wear the no.4 shirt at Manchester United.

The Dutch international has agreed to join the Reds from Bayern Munich (subject to registration), becoming the club’s third signing of the 2024 summer transfer window.

And now it has been revealed that the 25-year-old, who celebrated his birthday on Monday (12 August), will don the no.4 jersey when he takes to the field as a United player.

De Ligt has worn the very same number during most of his senior club career thus far, although he was no.36 during his first season at Ajax.

He famously rose to prominence as a youngster in Amsterdam, starting the 2017 UEFA Europa League final as a 17-year-old, where the Eredivisie club were beaten 2-0 by Jose Mourinho’s Reds.

Two years later, he moved to Juventus, winning Serie A in his first season. Then, in 2022, he moved to Bayern Munich, again winning the league title in his first year.

Only at international level, with the Netherlands, has he veered away from the no.4, often adopting the no.3 shirt.

Matthijs is now set to follow a list of famous United names into the same beloved shirt number in M16.

But while the no.4 is typically associated with defensive players in the modern era, great United midfielders from years gone by have also worn it while at Old Trafford.

Perhaps the Red most associated with the shirt is a centre-back, though: the rugged Steve Bruce, who helped United to four Premier League titles (two as club captain) during the 1990s.

Fellow centre-backs David May and Phil Jones also lifted the Premier League trophy while wearing no.4.

But many midfielders have graced the shirt, too. Pat Crerand wore the number in the 1968 European Cup final, where United beat Benfica 4-1 to become the first English club to lift the trophy now known as the Champions League.

Owen Hargreaves mimicked Crerand in 2008, when he started the Champions League final in Moscow, where we recorded our third triumph in the competition thanks to a dramatic victory over Chelsea.

Back in 1985, Norman Whiteside scored one of the most famous goals in FA Cup final history, against Everton, while wearing no.4. The most recent wearer of the jersey was Fiorentina loanee Sofyan Amrabat, who turned in his own heroic FA Cup final performance at the end of last season.

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