MY ACCOUNT
Zlatan Ibrahimovic must “listen to his body” as he ponders his future in football after an injury-hit season with Milan, according to legendary Italian striker Francesco Totti.
The Roma icon also compared Ibrahimovic’s stop-start season to the end of his own playing career, although he acknowledged he was often benched despite not suffering from as many injuries as the Swede has.
Ibrahimovic could win his fifth Scudetto in the coming weeks, with Milan holding a slight advantage over Inter, Napoli, and Juventus at the Serie A summit, but has started just 11 of the Rossoneri’s 32 league games this term.
The Sweden international, who missed out on the chance to represent his country at the 2022 World Cup after a play-off defeat to Poland last month, has impressed when he has featured in Serie A, netting eight times in 19 league appearances at a rate of 117.25 minutes per goal.
But with Ibrahimovic reportedly set to miss another batch of games after suffering a knee strain, talk has turned to whether the legendary striker could hang up his boots in the near future.
Totti, however, hopes to see the 40-year-old play on if he can continue at a high level.
He said: “Ibra, listen to your body. Finish [the season] with a goal and then decide.
“Nobody can understand it like me, it’s scary. He made history, but now it depends [on his physical condition].
“I hope he will continue as long as he feels like it, but only if his body allows him to be able to be as decisive as he always has been.
“Ibra is a lion on and off the field. But playing 10 minutes and then stopping, spending more time in the medical room than on the pitch, being given injections, that’s heavy.
“It’s been five years [since Totti’s own retirement], but I remember all the sensations.
“Watching Ibra in the last period, I relive them, even if my situation it was a little different from his. I hadn’t had any particular injuries.
“I felt I could still give my contribution, but I was quickly pushed aside. I would not wish my last year on my worst enemy. It was very heavy on a mental level.
“[It was] exhausting, because when after a life on the pitch, you do not play continuously, especially at a certain age, you are not letting your body rest, you are making it rust.”
Totti scored one goal in 18 Serie A appearances during the 2016-17 season, his final campaign with the Giallorossi at the end of an incredible 25-year spell with the club, but all but one of those appearances came from the bench.
The 45-year-old registered 250 goals and 105 assists in a glittering Serie A career which saw him make 618 appearances overall, and said he would have loved to have played with Ibrahimovic.
He also believes Ibrahimovic could move into coaching at the end of his playing career, but would need to find a club capable of matching his ambitious personality.
Totti added: “If they were to propose to him to be a manager, he must immediately demand clarity and transparency.
“There are two questions to ask. What should I do? And who should I do it with?
“Ibrahimovic is a brilliant man, if we had played together, with my assists, he would have scored a hundred more goals!”
