Francesco Totti admits he would love to talk to Roma nemesis Luciano Spalletti again and is sure they will one day. ‘I gave my best with him and he’s one of the best coaches around. It’s a pity it ended like that.’
The captain had been very much in sync with his coach during the first spell on the bench from 2005 to 2009, but things changed when Spalletti returned from January 2016 to May 2017.
He increasingly pushed Totti to the bench and was openly blamed by the fans – and to a degree by Totti’s wife Ilary Blasi – for forcing his retirement.
This is why Totti felt such a sense of revenge in April 2016 when he came off the bench at the 86th minute with Roma trailing 2-1 at home to Torino and promptly scored two goals for the 3-2 victory.
“I put that moment after the Scudetto victory and the World Cup with Italy,” Totti told Twitch channel BepiTV.
“At that time, I felt excluded from everything. I have never gone against the coach in my career, but that period was strange. The better I felt, the less I got taken into consideration.
“That day was unforgettable for me. I can’t even describe it.”
He stayed on at Roma and with Spalletti for one more year before the club failed to offer him a new contract and he decided to retire, something for which the Giallorossi supporters have never forgiven the coach.
“I would like to speak to Spalletti and I am sure one day it’ll happen. I gave my best with him. He changed my role, I had a great rapport with him, it’s a pity to have ended like that.
“He is still one of the best coaches around. Nobody sets a team out the way he does.”
Totti also had some words of advice for current Roma starlet Nicolò Zaniolo, who continues to promise more than he delivers.
“I don’t understand what his natural role is. The real problem is that he lacks the mentality to take hold of Roma. There are levels in football and if you want to advance, you need to have the right mentality.”