Gianluigi Buffon heading into retirement, moving tribute from Leonardo Bonucci

A tribute to the longtime teammate and national team member.

Gianluigi Buffon is nearing retirement, and Leonardo Bonucci has decided to celebrate him via social media. In fact, the defender and now former Juventus captain chose Instagram to celebrate the man with whom he shared countless matches and victories both in bianconero and in the national team. For the termination of the goalkeeper’s contract currently still bound to Parma still lacks the officialdom.

“You have been Un1co. And you will be forever. I can’t even find the words to describe, what you were, what you taught me, what you gave me. Thank you Am1co M1o,” is the tribute Bonucci decided to post on Instagram. The post shows Buffon greeting the Juventus crowd and then in some moments of complicity with the defender.

According to reports from ‘Sky Sport,’ the former Juventus and Paris Saint-Germain goalkeeper, after turning down a pharaonic offer from Saudi Arabia, has decided to say goodbye to playing soccer after 28 years of an honorable professional career. Waiting for Buffon would be the Italian national team, which could appoint him head of delegation. His agent Silvano Martina in the coming days will negotiate with Parma to terminate his contract, which expires in 2024. Thereafter, the 1978-born may officially announce his retirement.

Gigi Buffon is one of those goalkeepers who have made history in Italian soccer. Always divided between Parma and Juventus, with a brief spell at Paris Saint-Germain in 2018-2019, he has won 10 scudetti with the Bianconeri jersey, and that is a record, but two other records he holds are the number of appearances in Serie A, 657, and in the national team, 176, with which he won the world title in 2006 and came close to success at the 2012 European Championships, won by Spain in the final precisely against the Azzurri.