New Brazilian signing Samuel donning the number nine shirt during LA Galaxy training

CARSON, Calif. – The official open of LA Galaxy training camp for media may be less than 24 hours away, but the players were on the field during the fifth full day of preseason on Monday.

The Galaxy’s official Twitter account revealed the number choices for several of LA’s newest additions including Samuel who was spotted wearing No. 9, forward Rob Friend who donned No. 16, midfielder Baggio Hušidić wore No. 6 while new center back Kyle Venter was spotted with the No. 31 shirt.  

The number that will get the most attention is certainly Samuel’s usage of the number nine shirt, which has gone unused since Swedish winger Christian Wilhelmsson wore the jersey during the latter stages of the 2012 season.  Galaxy number nines have long struggled with Jovan Kirovski’s four goals and two assists in 21 league appearances in 2010 serving as the best performance for an LA number nine in the club history.  Wilhelmsson tallied just a single goal and assist in nine MLS appearances spread across regular season and playoffs.  

In 2012, I broke down the history of every player to wear the number nine shirt for LA which you can see here.

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Can Samuel break the trend of struggling number nines?

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