$re = '/(half|quarter|third|\d+)|./m';
$str = 'here is some text with stuff inside that i dont need but also some that i do, here is a word half and quarter also 99 is too old for lego
heres another one with numbers 132 1244 5950 303 2022 and one and a half
plz help me with code i am struggling';
$subst = "\1";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php