Victor Munoz Takes Iconic No.23 Shirt at Liverpool

Victor Munoz has barely walked through the doors at Liverpool, but the number on his back already carries a story.

The World Cup-winning midfielder, signed from Osasuna in June, has been handed the No.23 shirt for his first season at Anfield. He reported for pre-season at the AXA Training Centre earlier this week, medal still fresh, reputation rising, and now joins a small, intriguing lineage.

No.23 is not just a spare number at Liverpool. It has history, personality, and a certain weight.

Recent History

Luis Diaz was the last to wear it, during the 2022/23 campaign, before stepping into the No.7 the following season. That switch underlined his growing status and placed him among a tiny group of players trusted with that digit in the Premier League era.

Go back further and the shirt is almost synonymous with one man: Jamie Carragher. He pulled on the No.23 for his entire 16-year Liverpool career, turning a squad number into a symbol of reliability, resilience, and a very particular Scouse stubbornness. For a generation, No.23 meant Carragher before it meant anything else.

Before him, another academy product gave it life. Robbie Fowler was the first to wear the number, taking it on for three seasons before moving to the No.9 shirt ahead of the 1996/97 campaign, once Ian Rush had vacated the Anfield front line. Fowler’s switch felt like a passing of the torch; from Rush’s era to his own.

Emre Can and Xherdan Shaqiri are the only other players to have turned out in the No.23, adding their own, shorter chapters to the story.

A New Chapter

Munoz now steps into that line, but he does so with a distinction none of his predecessors enjoyed. He arrives as a freshly crowned world champion, one of only six players to have lifted the World Cup while on Liverpool’s books, and the first since compatriots Pepe Reina and Fernando Torres did so with Spain in 2010.

His shirt number had remained unconfirmed while he was away at the tournament, even as fellow summer signing Jeremy Jacquet took the No.5. The wait is over. Andoni Iraola’s side made it clear on Wednesday: Victor Munoz will wear 23.

For some, it will always be Carragher’s number. For others, a reminder of Fowler’s early swagger or Diaz’s electric rise. Munoz now has the chance to attach a new image to it: a Spanish world champion, in red, trying to carve out his own place in a jersey that has rarely gone unnoticed.