Kevin De Bruyne Pictured Wearing Napoli’s Most Famous Shirt Number | OneFootball

Kevin De Bruyne has been seen wearing Napoli’s most famous ever shirt, prompting questions over whether he could become the first person to play in it in almost 20 years.

De Bruyne chose the Serie A champions last month after Manchester City made the decision not to offer the Premier League legend a new contract.

De Bruyne played no part at the recent FIFA Club World Cup, saying before he had left City that it “doesn’t make any sense”. There was also an element of protecting himself from potential injury before signing with a new team: “I have to take care of myself because if I get injured in the Club World Cup, what am I going to do? Nobody’s going to take care of me at that point.”

It means that, while his ex-City teammates were still playing until earlier this month and have only had two weeks of rest so far, the 34-year-old has already been able to start working with Napoli.

In multiple pictures published by the club, De Bruyne has been seen with No. 10 on his training kit.

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That was, of course, the jersey once worn by Diego Maradona.

The Argentine icon single-handedly turned Napoli into a powerhouse of Italian and European football in the 1980s, steering the club to its first ever Serie A titles in 1986–87 and 1989–90.

When Maradona passed away at the age of 60 in 2020, Napoli renamed the stadium in his honour.

The No. 10 shirt had already been permanently retired during his lifetime, in 2006, not always a common practice in football as opposed to the Big Four sports in the United States. The last player to officially wear it was Mariano Bogliacino in the Supercoppa di Lega C1, far down Italy’s football pyramid. The jersey was originally retired in 2000, but Napoli had to reissue it only four years later due to their demotion to Serie C1 and league regulations that started numbers 1–11 must be worn.

But, regardless of his own stature, the likelihood of No. 10 being unretired for De Bruyne now feels slim, even if it being printed on his training kit has set pulses racing.