Francesco Totti hints at unlikely Serie A return aged 48 – but rules out one club

Former Italy worldwide Francesco Totti has claimed he has been requested by top-flight groups to make an sudden return to the skilled recreation – and it’s an possibility he’s open to.

One of many Azzurri’s greatest legends of the sport, Totti retired in 2017 after spending his complete skilled profession at AS Roma, scoring 250 Serie A targets to be the competitors’s second-highest scorer of all time.

Nevertheless, greater than seven years after calling it a day, the now-48-year-old believes he may nonetheless have an effect within the prime flight, such is the paucity of expertise in his outdated position – and in addition feels he could possibly be in control to contribute in Serie A by the brand new 12 months, had been he to signal for a membership.

“There have been Serie A groups that known as me,” he stated throughout an interview with Gazzetta dello Sport. “I admit that they made me assume slightly, slightly loopy. It could be tough, however in life you by no means say by no means. There are gamers who’ve performed a few years after the tip of their profession. It additionally relies on the place you play, with all due respect, but when I had been to return to Serie A I must prepare very well.

“With the extent of immediately’s Serie A I may simply have my say on the pitch. I’d be prepared in two to 3 months,” he added. “I’m nonetheless taking part in at 48. Half an hour, twenty minutes.”

Totti didn’t disclose the names of the groups who had approached him over a possible return, although he did unsurprisingly rule out taking part in for one workforce: Roma’s greatest rivals. Even so, one other home workforce may get the good thing about his technical high quality and experience in some unspecified time in the future, he feels.

“Lazio? I wouldn’t have even thought-about it,” he stated. “That’s simply speak, it’s a joke.

“If I needed to do one thing loopy, I’d do it in Italy, not overseas.

“Once you flip the web page you by no means know what awaits you. Perhaps that’s additionally why I’ve had that factor inside me. It’s true that there’s a starting and an finish to all the pieces. A ten in Italy? There isn’t one, I may come again.”

Totti’s final look for Roma got here in Could 2017 when he changed Mohamed Salah as a second-half substitute.

He additionally served as a director for the membership till 2019, leaving after an obvious falling out with then-chairman James Pallotta.