Buffon: ‘I won’t be a Coach’

By Football Italia staff

Juventus captain Gianluigi Buffon feels “a desire to compete which is strange for my age”, but won’t be a club Coach when he retires.

The goalkeeper could hang up his gloves at the end of the season, and he spoke to La Repubblica ahead of his 40th birthday on Sunday.

“You won’t believe it, but at this point I’m a happy person,” Buffon insisted, despite missing out on the World Cup and his recent injury.

“I prefer to find myself on the high seas with no fuel after crossing at a speed of 100 knots, rather than returning slowly and sadly to port.

“The tears in Milan went beyond the bitterness for a failure we thought was impossible, it was the consequence of a great sporting responsibility to the whole country, and the reaction of a man who at forty feels emotions more profoundly than when he was twenty.

“As for the injury, nothing happens by chance. The break was good for me, it sent me a clear message and forced me to think, and now I feel a desire to compete which is strange for my age.

“What will I do next? I’m still not thinking about it…

“A few days ago I asked Lippi for advice, we spoke on the phone. He told me to take a sabbatical year, Marcello told me to look at the football world from the outside with a bit of detachment and understand what I’m really interested in.

“I’ll tell you again, I’m not looking for a safe haven: it’s always better to live with a bit of anxiety.

“I’ve always lived with fear but I’ve learned to keep it at bay, I’ve become more humble. After [I retire] I want to work, that’s all.”

“Could I be a Coach? If it happens I won’t be a club Coach. I have a partner and three children who Iove dearly and 28 years of life behind me which people organised by the minute.

“I’d like to have the luxury of boredom. There are moments in which I wish to be alone, but only half-days of mine where I can do anything, where nothing is forbidden to me.

“I wouldn’t mind a job as a CT, it’s a stimulating commitment with an institutional and educational responsibility; representing an entire country and uniting, not dividing.

“Italy? No. I said I’d like to be a national team CT, not [that I wanted to do it] for the Azzurri.”

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