I was speaking about this to a sports psychologist last night who probably knows more about this than anyone on here.

He says that the squad numbers have little bearing on how players perform, especially for senior pros who have been playing for years. Apart from those who want numbers for superstitious reasons, the only people who are bothered about this is young players breaking into the squad and being given a squad number (any number) in the first place.

The thing that set me off was the comment about the confidence boost for Grix and he agreed with me that for someone like Grix, his number is irrelevant.

Looking at 1-13, it does look like our strongest team, so it's a boost now for the players who are in it as they will be thinking that if there are no injuries, they'll be playing the first game. But that's as far it goes and is no different to a manager naming any team a week before the match as the players picked would receive the same boost.

Someone started a thread? It must be happening.

It has happened

As said many a time with rumours; I'll believe it when I see an official post.

It makes me laugh when people dismiss player gossip outright.

RL is a very small community and things get leaked all of the time.

You could see Vectrabeast was on to something and wasn't a WUM. If he was, there are bigger WUMs than Paul Wood leaving.

I'll believe it when its official.