diff --git a/moo/mooutils/eggregex.c b/moo/mooutils/eggregex.c
index fb16cd39..9b9d940a 100644
--- a/moo/mooutils/eggregex.c
+++ b/moo/mooutils/eggregex.c
@@ -443,8 +443,7 @@ egg_regex_fetch_pos (EggRegex      *regex,
 {
   /* make sure the sub expression number they're requesting is less than
    * the total number of sub expressions that were matched. */
-  if (match_num >= regex->matches)
-    return;
+  g_return_if_fail (match_num < regex->matches);
 
   if (start_pos)
     *start_pos = regex->offsets[2 * match_num];
@@ -1366,3 +1365,13 @@ egg_regex_escape (const char *string,
 
     return escaped;
 }
+
+
+int
+egg_regex_get_string_number (EggRegex   *regex,
+                             const char *name)
+{
+    g_return_val_if_fail (regex != NULL, PCRE_ERROR_NULL);
+    g_return_val_if_fail (name != NULL, PCRE_ERROR_NULL);
+    return _pcre_get_stringnumber (regex->regex, name);
+}
diff --git a/moo/mooutils/eggregex.h b/moo/mooutils/eggregex.h
index 76ab4ab7..c6c35146 100644
--- a/moo/mooutils/eggregex.h
+++ b/moo/mooutils/eggregex.h
@@ -166,6 +166,10 @@ gchar     *egg_regex_replace_eval (EggRegex              *regex,
 				   gpointer               user_data,
 				   EggRegexMatchFlags     match_options);
 
+int        egg_regex_get_string_number (EggRegex         *regex,
+                                   const char            *name);
+
+
 gchar *egg_regex_eval_replacement (EggRegex              *regex,
 				   const gchar           *string,
 				   const gchar           *replacement,