Bruno Fernandes has sent a tongue-in-cheek message back to Juan Mata after the Spaniard commented on his former Manchester United teammate taking his number eight shirt at Old Trafford.
Mata left United when his contract expired last month after eight-and-a-half years at the club. Having donned the number 10 at Chelsea, Mata adopted the number 8 upon his 2014 arrival.
It meant Fernandes couldn’t take up his favoured number when he arrived from Sporting Lisbon in January 2020. The 27-year-old was instead handed the number 18.
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But Mata’s exit opened the door for Fernandes to claim his favourite number. The likes of Paul Ince, Nicky Butt and Wayne Rooney have worn the number for United during the Premier League era.
Now Fernandes will have the opportunity to write his own history with the shirt. On Friday, Mata shared a photo of him and Fernandes embracing and chatting during a match on his Instagram story.
With it, the 34-year-old wrote: “I know you’ve been wanting this number since day one… enjoy it now… I miss you too,” along with a laughing emoji and a sad face emoji.
In response, Fernandes re-shared it to his own story with laughing, love eyes and wide eyes emojis, writing: “I was happy with the 18 if you’d have stayed at the club, but because you’re not and so to (not) miss you that much, I kept your number with me.”
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