Maths and Spanish are behind Cuadrado’s brilliantly logical new shirt number

Juan Cuadrado may have lost his Juventus shirt number to Cristiano Ronaldo, but his new number could be the most cryptic the world of football has ever seen.

Cuadrado had held the number seven shirt in Turin, but with the arrival of five-time Ballon d’Or winner Ronaldo, that is no longer the case.

The tweet was translated by Twitter as reading: “More blessed is to give than to receive; Panita Blessings (folded hands emoji) @cristiano in this new adventure”.

So the winger needs a new number, and after more than 150,000 votes were cast on Twitter, number 49 was the winner.

But why?

Well “Cuadrado” translates into Spanish as “square” and with the Colombia footballer’s previous number being seven, he simply squared it to make 49. Clever stuff.

Meanwhile, after including teammate Paulo Dybala’s number 10 in the poll and tagging him in the post, Dybala responded suggesting 21 might be better.

Who knew the world of football shirt numbers could be so absorbing?