Alvaro Morata changes his shirt number: Are Chelsea getting a new striker?

Humans aspire to lead an eventful life. Luckily, our lives are marked by events and one of those many events is when someone becomes a parent for the very first time in his/her life.  Alvaro Morata, the Spanish striker plying his trade for the South London club, Chelsea, and his partner Alice Campello recently became happy parents to two healthy twins.

And to honour the birth of his twins, Alvaro Morata changed his shirt number to 29 from 9 as he became a proud father on 29th July 2018. In an interview that was posted on Chelsea’s twitter handle, Alvaro Morata was quoted as saying, “It is a day I will never forget, to welcome my twin sons into the world. My family is so important to me and I want to honour them and my wife, Alice when I am on the pitch which is why I have decided to take a different number for the new season and remember this special day by adding the number 2 to my shirt.”

Traditionally, the number 9 is adorned by the top striker in the team. Alvaro Morata, who arrived from Real Madrid last season for a club-record 59.4 million pounds, has been blowing cold ever since his good start to the previous season.

In the second half of the season, Morata was underwhelming and finished the season with a meagre total of 15 goals and 6 assists in 48 games.

His goal-drought in the latter half also led to his axing from the Spanish national team which went on to reach the pre-quarters of the recently concluded World Cup.

Also, ex-manager Antonio Conte brought in the seasoned Olivier Giroud in January due to erratic form of Morata. There were also rumours linking Gonzalo Higuain to Chelsea considering the newly-appointed manager, Maurizio Sarri, has already worked with him during his time at Napoli.

Though Higuain has already signed with AC Milan Chelsea’s need for a world-class striker is well-documented. Robert Lewandowski is another player with whom Chelsea has been regularly linked with. Since the Premier League transfer window closes on 9th August, we might also see Chelsea swooping in for world-class number 9, who could do justice to creative geniuses of Hazard and Willian and adorn the number 9 on the back of his shirt as well.

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