Skip to main content

Argentina legend Juan Román Riquelme has shown his displeasure with the current generation of football players, claiming that they are ‘less interested in football’ and value their personal time more.

The former Barcelona midfielder – who was considered to be one of the most talented Argentine players of his generation – has hit out on the fact that this generation’s footballers don’t solely concentrate on the game but instead indulge themselves in social media, showing off their ‘dances’ and latest hairstyles.

The Argentine commented on young players today, as quoted by ESPN: “We used to love football; we didn’t care about dances or anything like that. Now they care about photo with hair stylists and walks with their dogs.”

5a9fbccc74758f8be8000001.jpg

The 39-year-old continued: "I loved to get to know all the players and I believed that watching football I learned every day, I felt I could learn. Now I see new things that could not be done, I do not know if I could take it, thank God I lived in an earlier era.

"It used to depend on me, now I suffer a lot with every game. I get angry, I get a little irritated because I can not do anything."

#https://instagram.com/p/BgAcvogFyCM

The former Argentine international retired in 2015 after a 20-year playing career. He started his career in Argentina with Boca Juniors before moving to Barcelona where he enjoyed a four-year spell, scoring five goals in 41 games for the Catalan club.

He then made a switch to Villareal in which he boasted an impressive tally of 45 goals in 141 games for the Yellow Submarine. He finished his playing career in his homeland, rejoining his boyhood club before retiring in 2015 with Argentinos.