Will wore the no 13 throughout his career, not just in the RWC final.
It stemmed from a superstition, but not his own (originally).
When Will started his England career, his centre partner was Jerry Guscott and Guscott had a superstition about the number 13 so he always wore 12. As the new cap, Greenwood was effectively forced to wear the no 13.
Will also wore 13 during his Tigers career, despite playing at 12.
BelperJon wrote:
If memory serves me correctly, Bath (Guscott's club) never used the No 13 shirt. They would be numbered 1-16 with no 13. This meant 14 was the OC, 15 on the wing and 16 at full back.
Correct ...... Guscott used to wear 12 , and de Glanville wore 14 .
Once rugby went professional , all clubs had to wear 1-15 , so Bath had to adopt a no.13 , and certain other clubs had to ditch letters .
Lancastrian by birth, a Sandgrounder by the grace of God
Following this line of enquiry, there was another club that didn't use 13 wasn't there? Was it Saracens, I can't remember?
Of course Bristol used to use letters, but in the reverse order to Leicester (A being their full back, not their loosehead prop). All lovely traditions but you can see why the authorities wanted one set of standards!
Will Greenwood was here during the letter era wasn't he? Did he play with M on his back?
John
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He is able to lift up a heavy object when that heavy object says "lift me now".
Lord Harbinger of Doom wrote:Will wore the no 13 throughout his career, not just in the RWC final.
It stemmed from a superstition, but not his own (originally).
When Will started his England career, his centre partner was Jerry Guscott and Guscott had a superstition about the number 13 so he always wore 12. As the new cap, Greenwood was effectively forced to wear the no 13.
Will also wore 13 during his Tigers career, despite playing at 12.
IIRC..... Greenwood was forced to wear his unfavoured 12 shirt when touring with the Lions. And was therefore wearing 12 when he suffered what could have been a life threatening injury in South Africa.
Hence his later and ongoing superstition about wearing 13 instead of 12.
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