Jari Litmanen achieved more than most of us mere mortals could ever dream of during his 24-year professional career.
He spent the bulk of the 1990s as one of the planet’s best attacking midfielders, dazzling with Ajax, where he was key to the club’s superlative 1995 Champions League under Louis van Gaal, before enjoying stints at Barcelona and Liverpool, and then returning to Ajax before a somewhat nomadic end to his career.
At the international level, his 137 caps for Finland remain the nation’s all-time record, with the only blot on his copybook being Litmanen’s injury record in his later years.
Litmanen on his short-lived Fulham spell
It was this poor luck with injuries that saw his spells at Barcelona and Liverpool end prematurely, with his Ajax return also cut short when the club released him from his contract in the spring of 2004.
A brief return to Finland with Lahti followed before he joined German side Hansa Rostock for half a season as the club were relegated from the Bundesliga. Litmanen’s next stop was Swedish side, but he would make just 12 appearances in two-and-a-half years due to a number of injuries.
With Litmanen still showing his class when he did play, he was handed a lifeline in January 2008 from his former Finland boss Roy Hodgson, who was now in charge at Fulham. After an initial ten-day trial shortly before his 37th birthday, Litmanen signed with the Cottagers, but he would play just one reserve team match that season before being released.
“I’d had a tough period with injuries,” he tells FourFourTwo. “When Hodgson took over at Fulham, I was without a club – he offered me the chance to join and I was excited.
“Unfortunately, soon after signing, I suffered heart rhythm problems that kept me out for weeks, followed by calf and head injuries.
“In the end, a combination of my health issues and the team’s need for fit players meant Hodgson stopped counting on me.”
Litmanen then returned to his former club Lahti where he was able to turn out more than 50 times over the next three seasons before the club were relegated.
The 40-year-old Litmanen still had one more move in him, as he signed a one-year deal with the reigning Finnish champions HJK, where he would win a league and cup double, while Litmanen was able to become one of a handful of professional footballers to play in four different decades, as his career that began in the 1980s came to a close in 2011.
