Martin O’Neill backing his lucky number ahead of Euro 16 showdown

So what’s the story with Martin O’Neill and the number 31?

Football conspiracy theorists have long puzzled over why, throughout his managerial career, O’Neill has worn that number on his tracksuits, with the man himself always declining requests to explain its significance.

One of the more complicated – and therefore, to conspiracy theorists, hugely popular – explanations relates to O’Neill’s time at Celtic, when he inherited a Brazilian defender called Rafael Scheidt who basically lived up to all the your favourites stereotypes of what a Brazilian defender cannot do, ie defend.