Francesco Totti relates to Cristiano Ronaldo’s situation in recent months. Ronaldo ended up on the bench at both Manchester United and the Portugal national team. Totti also played less than he wanted in his last seasons at AS Roma.
“If you see what has happened in the last few months, it’s like reliving my own experiences,” says the now 46-year-old Totti in an interview with Twitch channel BepiTV. “It’s easy to pass judgment from the outside but only the protagonists know what really happened. We are talking about one of the best players in history and he deserves respect,” he added.
Ronaldo was put on the bench at Manchester United by Erik ten Hag and said in a later interview that he had ‘no respect’ for the trainer. At Totti, Luciano Spalletti was the culprit: from Spalletti’s arrival in January 2016, Totti was less discussed and a year and a half later he stopped as a footballer. Supporters of Roma and even wife Ilary Blasi did not thank Spalletti for that role in the career. Totti himself would like to speak to Spalletti again.
“I’m sure it will happen one day,” said the Roma club legend. “I gave everything when he was a coach. It’s a shame how it ended, but he remains one of the best trainers in the world. Nobody can put down a team like he does.” Still, Totti felt some form of satisfaction when he came on in the 86th minute in April 2016 when they were 1-2 down against Torino and scored a 3-2 win with a double, he admits.
“I only place that moment behind winning the Scudetto and the World Cup. At that moment I felt left out of everything that was happening. I’ve never been at odds with a trainer, but it was a strange period,” Totti looks back. “The better I felt, the less I played. That was an unforgettable day for me. I can not describe it.”
The World Cup is over for Ronaldo, but Lionel Messi hopes to win his first world title on Sunday. Totti, who himself became world champion in 2006, does not yet rank Messi at the level of Diego Maradona. “Messi and Maradona are two alien players. Maradona is the definition of football. Messi is the best player but is still under Maradona. It is difficult to find the right words to describe them, because they are out of the ordinary. That also applies to Ronaldo,” he concluded.
