AFTER hanging up his boots aged 40, a Finnish football legend is making his return 15 years later.
Jari Litmanen, 55, has been unveiled by Tallinna Kalev’s third team in Estonia.
Jari Litmanen is coming out of retirement to play for an Estonian third-teamCredit: Alamy
Litmanen won the Champions League with Ajax in 1995Credit: Alamy
Once an legend – who was instrumental in their victory in 1995 – Litmanen last played professionally for HJK Helsinki in 2011.
In his last season in the Finnish capital, he won his only league title in his home nation.
Tallinna Kalev will be the tenth club of Jari Litmanen’s globetrotting career.
But the midfielder – nicknamed ‘The King’ – has gone between Estonia and Finland for TEN years already.
His family lives in the capital, Tallinn, while he works as a pundit on Finnish TV in Helsinki.
Litmanen – who has 137 caps for – also featured in the line-ups for and .
His new Estonian team is owned by former Reds defender Ragnar Klavan.
On X, one fan wrote: “The King of Finland.”
Another said: “Trip to Tallinn absolutely ahead.”
Someone else added: “He was my childhood idol when he played for Ajax. He was so good.”
But this isn’t the first time he’s been tempted out of retirement.
Litmanen told The Athletic that he was briefly tempted out of retirement last October to play alongside his sons, Caro and Bruno, for Tallinna Kalev Juunior in the fourth tier of Estonian .
He said: “Suddenly, they had a small group and as I’d been doing some training on the field, their coach said: ‘Is it possible for you to practise with us so we have one player more?’
“I thought: ‘Why not?’. I trained, I registered, and then came on for the last 30 minutes of the final game with my boys, who were 17 and 19 at the time.
“To share the pitch with them like that was amazing.
“The other young lads didn’t know anything about me, but their parents knew.
“After the game, they were the ones wanting to have a selfie.”
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Eze Chidiebere Paul
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