The Beautiful Symmetry of Marcelo Salas’ Career

The great Chilean striker Marcelo Salas said his final goodbye to football this week, and appropriately enough he signed off with a hat-trick in his Chile XI vs Friends of Salas testimonial, in front of 50,000 in Santiago (above).

Salas officially retired when the 2008 Chilean season ended back in November, but this gave his career the ending it deserved.

His goalscoring record speaks for itself. Chile’s highest ever goalscorer with 37 in 70, and (according to the all knowing Wikipedia) 211 goals in 453 club games in three different countries.

But what I really love about Salas’ career is the symmetry.

It started with three seasons at Universidad de Chile before heading to River Plate in Argentina for two years, then Serie A with Lazio and Juventus (he won Serie A titles with both), before returning to River Plate for another two years and ending with another three seasons at Universidad de Chile.

He couldn’t have planned it any better. If you can’t have the Maldini career (quarter of a century at one team) then returning to your original or hometown club in later years is the next best thing. Henrik Larsson is doing the same thing right now, playing his final days at Helsingborg.

But I get the feeling this sort of thing is going to happen less and less now. With leagues in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Uzbekistan willing to throw money at players in the latter stages of their career (not to mention MLS, A-League and J-League) there’s a danger that the romantic return and a fond farewell will fall out of fashion.

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Category: World Football