5 footballers who never believed in training

#1 Romario

Romario celebrates

Romario was a wonderfully gifted player and there are still some in Brazil who consider him the most talented player to have emerged from the country since Pele.

But Romario never possessed the same singular drive to be the best that lifted Pele to such heights. He was technically impressive and finished superbly, but he liked to party and his ardent aversion to training meant that he wasn’t always in his best shape come match day.

When he announced his retirement in 2008, he made his dislike of training patently clear: “I’m happy,” he said. “Because I won’t have to train again, or travel or sit in team hotels.”

Romario would always try and negotiate deals with his coaches to avoid attending training, particularly when it was set to clash with the Rio de Janeiro carnival.

As the late Johan Cruyff once recalled: “One time, Romario asked me if he could miss two days of training to return to Brazil for the carnival. I replied: ‘If you score two goals tomorrow, I’ll give you two extra days rest compared to the other players.’ The next day, Romario scored his second goal 20 minutes into the game and immediately gestured to me asking to leave. He told me: ‘Coach, my plane leaves in an hour.’”