Football legend Andrés Iniesta hangs up his boots at 40

LEADERSHIP

Former Barcelona midfielder Andrés Iniesta has confirmed his retirement after 22 years at football’s highest level.

During his robust football career, the midfielder won four Champions Leagues in a decade and a half in Barcelona’s first team.

He also clinched the World Cup, scoring in the 2010 final, and two European Championships for Spain in 2008 and 2012.

Now aged 40, the legendary playmaker officially hung up his boots in an emotional announcement on Monday in a video posted to his social media channels.

The video, captioned with the phrase, “The game will go on,” showed Iniesta emotionally discussing what football means to him, before tributes were paid by a number of iconic football figures including Pep Guardiola, Louis van Gaal and Luis Enrique.

Iniesta was most recently playing for UAE Pro-League club Emirates, where he had an option to extend his contract until 2025, but decided to call it quit with his playing career.

Iniesta famously scored the winning goal in the 2010 World Cup final as Spain lifted the trophy for the first and only time in the country’s history, while he made almost 900 club appearances across spells with Barça, Vissel Kobe and Emirates.

After joining Barça’s academy aged 12 in 1996 while initially living at La Masia, Iniesta went on to make 54 appearances for the club’s B team before breaking into the senior side in 2002.

During a storied era for the club, playing alongside the likes of Carles Puyol, Xavi Hernández and Lionel Messi, Iniesta helped form the spine of a team that won numerous Champions Leagues and LaLiga titles.

He eventually left Barça in 2018 after making almost 700 appearances and winning nine LaLiga titles and four Champions Leagues among the 32 trophies he won with the club.

At international level, he won 131 caps for Spain and was a key part of the La Roja side that won back-to-back European Championships and the World Cup between 2008 and 2012.