STEVEN Gillespie will wear the No.9 shirt for Colchester United for the new season.

STEVEN Gillespie will wear the No.9 shirt for Colchester United for the new season.

Gillespie will be hoping to finally put all his injury troubles of the last few years behind him, and get back to scoring regularly in his new No.9 jersey. He wore the No. 18 shirt last term.

The U’s new summer trio of Michael Rose (No. 3), Tom Eastman (No. 18) and Karl Duguid (No. 27) have also been handed their numbers – Duguid regularly wore the No. 7 shirt for the U’s during his first spell at the club, and had squad No. 20 for most of his time at previous club Plymouth.

Duguid played for the first hour during last night’s pre-season friendly at Woodbridge Town, which a mostly young U’s side won 4-1 thanks to goals from Alex Gilbey, Freddie Ladapo, Ben Coker and Craig Arnott.

Manager John Ward is still on the look-out for a new striker for the coming season, and the No. 11 slot is one those still vacant.

Here is a list of the U’s new squad numbers for the 2011-12 season:

1 Williams

3 Rose

4 Okuonghae

5 Baldwin

6 Heath

7 Vincent

8 O’Toole

9 Gillespie

10 Izzet

12 Cousins

14 Bond

15 Odejayi

16 Henderson

18 Eastman

20 Wilson

22 Wordsworth

23 James

24 Coker

25 White

27 Duguid

30 Arnott

31 Hamilton

32 Sanderson

34 Bender

35 Pentney