Zab ponders hanging up boots in summer
PABLO Zabaleta says he might be forced to retire this summer if fans are banned from stadiums next season.
The former City defender is nearing the end of his contract at West Ham, and is expected to leave the London Stadium this summer. He received a moving send-off during City’s win over the Hammers in February after nine trophy-laden years at the Etihad between 2008 and 2017.
The 35-year-old has said that another season of playing, perhaps in Italy, is a possibility, but that the current lockdown across Europe has thrown his plans up in the air.
The Premier League season is still suspended indefinitely, while the French and Dutch league seasons have been forced to end prematurely.
Bundesliga clubs have been allowed to resume their campaign, but behind closed doors, and if the Premier League – or any other division – wants to re-start fixtures then the likelihood is that fans will not be allowed to watch games at the stadiums.
That absence of fans is something
Zabaleta admits could persuade him to retire early, rather than seek to join another club.
He told La Nacion via Goal: “I think about it every day. I wake up thinking, ‘Is this what awaits me after retirement?’
“Now, somehow, we’ll go back to training and we will see. But it’s all still uncertain.
“I had even come to think, at the end of this season, to give myself the joy of playing one more season in another league, perhaps in Italy, but now I don’t know.
“The chances are you won’t play in front of a crowd, so what motivation could I have left? Why go to Italy if mythical stadiums like the Olimpico in Rome or San Siro will be closed?”
Zabaleta has also revealed that City players were dreaming of seeing Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi sign for the club after the 2008 takeover.
He said: “Ten days after my arrival, the purchase of the club by the people of Abu Dhabi is done.
“Four days later, they invest £40m for Robinho and there I said, ‘I’m not going to last six months here.’
“We took it a bit as a joke and...in the locker room we started putting ‘Messi’, ‘Cristiano Ronaldo’.”