captain so far Belgium and offensive real Madrid, Eden Hazard31, announced this Wednesday leaving the national team After an early defeat at the World Cup in Qatar, where the Red Devils failed to make it past the group stage.
“A page has been opened today. Thank you for your love. Thank you for your unparalleled support. Thank you for all these happiness shared since 2008. I decided to end my international career,” said the football player, and shared a post on his Instagram account on Wednesday.
player, who He will be 32 years old in January. The player, whose performance in the national team has been criticized recently and who remained in the top five when he did not have a minute in Real Madrid, again with the same message, “time is ready” and guaranteed that he will miss the qualifying.
Hazard played 126 international matches in 133 calls He made his debut for the national team on 19 November 2008 at the age of 17, scoring 33 goals in the last 14 years.
Following the news, the Belgian Football Association issued a thank you message on Twitter: “Best wishes, Captain.”
The federation also added a 2018 video of Hazard celebrating in front of thousands of fans at Brussels’ Grand Place; followed by third place at the World Cup in Russia, Belgium’s biggest football success ever.
Hazard’s departure from the national team comes after the World Cup debacleThe match where Belgium beat Canada (1-0), lost to Morocco (0-2) and drew against Croatia (0-0), but failed to reach the last 16.
The captain who started the first two games, Playing only in the last 15 minutes, he took third place as a substitute.. His performance throughout the tournament was far from his past performance when he was unstable.
“Belgium will be remembered for a long time, with some of their matches, notably the round of 16, which marked a brilliant goal against Hungary in 2016, or their five-star performance against Brazil in the World Cup two years later.” local newspaper DH Les Sports.
He was up against the 2016 Euro Cup when then coach Marc Wilmots gave him the captain’s armband in 2015. Hazard leaves Red Devils as fourth most international appearances player In Belgian history, Jan Vertonghen (145) is behind Axel Witsel (130) and Toby Alderweireld (127).
He started his professional career in French Lille in the 2007-2008 season, where he was already playing in the sub-categories. Playing five seasons in the first category, he declared himself league and cup champion in 2011.
He signed for Chelsea in 2012, where he played for seven years, and proved to be a player of exceptional class.Having won two editions of the Europa League (2013 and 2019) and two other editions of the “Premier” (2015 and 2017), among other successes, he finally ended up at Real Madrid in the 2019-2020 campaign, thereby fulfilling one of his duties. sports dreams
Hazard came to the white club as a star, but three years of injuries and poor performance, which seems to have recovered, have pushed him into the background. Carlo Ancelotti, whose minutes are scarce, also has continuity in his team.
The captain’s “goodbye” comes the departure of the coach in the last six years, the Spaniard Roberto Martínez, Kevin De Bruyne, Hazard, Thibaut Courtois, Romelu Lukaku, Yannick Carrasco, Thomas Vermaelen, Witsel, Thomas Meunier or Vincent Kompany.
Belgium, which has not yet replaced Martínez on the bench, will play its next international match against Sweden on 24 March as part of the Euro 2024 qualifying phase.