Updated at 20.54
VETERAN LEAGUE of Ireland star Raffaele Cretaro has confirmed he is retiring from football.
The 39-year-old forward spent 20 years playing in Irish football.
In 2020, he helped Finn Harps maintain their Premier Division status with an eighth-place finish, also lining out for Ollie Horgan’s men in the 2019 campaign.
However, he will be best remembered as a footballer for his 17 seasons at Sligo Rovers, scoring 86 goals in 531 matches for the Bit O’Red and subsequently describing his time there as a “fairytale”.
The Tubbercurry native first joined the Showgrounds outfit in 2000, going on to win the league title and two FAI Cups during his time there, while also having short stints with Bohemians and Galway United.
Announcing the news today, Cretaro tweeted: “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened, football owes me nothing, I owe it everything. A simple Go raibh maith agat.”
Don’t cry because it’s over smile because it happened, football owes me nothing i owe it everything.
— Raff Cretaro (@RaffCretaro) January 1, 2021
A simple
Go raibh maith agat ⚽️❤️ pic.twitter.com/MzOGs5g9Sa