A 110-year-old football tradition may be coming to an end.
The era of captains who became inseparable from their clubs — figures such as Franco Baresi, Francesco Totti, Giacinto Facchetti and Giuseppe Furino — is gradually giving way to a game shaped increasingly by rotation, contracts and the realities of modern professional football.
The number of players who could still be described as true “one-club men” or “flag players” is shrinking by the year.
The story dates back exactly 110 years. Wilfred “Billie” Nevill, a British Army officer serving during the First World War, is regarded as one of the most symbolic figures in the history of football captaincy.
As he returned from his final leave before the Battle of the Somme, Nevill took four footballs with him. He gave one to each company and instructed his soldiers to kick the balls towards the German positions and retrieve them as they advanced through the machine-gun fire.
Nearly 60,000 soldiers were killed or wounded on the first day of the Somme. Captain Billie Nevill was among the dead, killed on the barbed wire in front of the German lines.
One of the footballs is now displayed at Dover Castle. The tradition of referring to the first player in a team as the “captain” is sometimes traced back to his story.
Baresi and the end of a symbolic era
The latest chapter in that long history was visible just two days ago at Franco Baresi’s funeral.
Milan supporters said goodbye to one of the club’s greatest icons with the chant: “There is only one captain.”
Yet the story also carries an irony. Some of the players who went on to wear the Milan captain’s armband after Baresi — and who are now being mentioned as potential future figures at the club — were themselves heavily criticised by supporters during their careers.
The captains of football’s past were figures of very different personalities: dignified leaders such as Beckenbauer, innovators such as Cruyff, revolutionaries such as Maradona, players who carried the fate of their teams on their shoulders such as Antognoni and Totti, and fighters such as Furino and Bruscolotti.
A captain was never simply the player wearing the armband.
He represented a set of values, embodied the hierarchy within the dressing room, stood for leadership and reinforced the bond between a club and its players.
Today, however, there is an increasingly common argument: captains are disappearing because the players who become synonymous with their clubs are disappearing too.
Lautaro Martinez is an exception
There are still players keeping the tradition alive.
Inter captain Lautaro Martinez is perhaps one of the clearest examples.
The Argentina forward combines many of the qualities associated with the classic captain: talent, loyalty to his club and leadership on the pitch. Despite having the opportunity to move elsewhere, Martinez chose to remain at Inter and has increasingly taken on a leadership role within the squad.
His efforts to calm tensions following the dispute involving Hakan Calhanoglu, as well as the breakdown of his friendship with Romelu Lukaku after the Belgian forward’s failure to return to Inter, have been cited as examples of a captain whose influence extends well beyond the symbolism of the armband.
Napoli captain Giovanni Di Lorenzo has also played an important role in two of the club’s championship victories. But whether he has become a figure as deeply identified with Napoli as Antonio Juliano or Luka Modric are with their respective clubs remains open to debate.
The rise of “one person, one vote”
In modern football, captaincy is increasingly becoming a bureaucratic role.
Rotation, democratic distribution of responsibility or simply the number of appearances for a team can sometimes carry more weight in deciding the captain than charisma or a player’s emotional connection with the club.
The captain risks being reduced from the team’s leader to the man responsible for calling the coin toss before kick-off.
And yet, particularly in the lower divisions and smaller footballing communities, the old tradition remains remarkably strong.
Francesco Magnanelli spent 17 years at Sassuolo, witnessing the club’s rise from Serie C2 to Serie A. The retirement of the club’s No. 4 shirt reflects the place he occupies in Sassuolo’s history. Domenico Berardi, meanwhile, has also spent more than 16 years at the club.
Sudtirol captain Fabian Tait was born in the Alto Adige region and has made more than 400 appearances for the club. His footballing role model is perhaps fittingly another legendary captain: Javier Zanetti.
“Being able to play football in the same place as your family and friends is the greatest fortune in the world,” Tait has said.
Sergio Pellissier, one of Chievo’s defining figures, spent 17 years at the club before eventually buying it and attempting to rebuild it from the third tier.
His roles as president, player and captain represent one of the clearest surviving examples of the old football ideal.
At the top level, money is increasingly decisive
At the highest level of the game, however, loyalty to a club is increasingly shaped by financial realities.
Marquinhos has spent 13 years at Paris Saint-Germain and earns around €13 million a year. Barcelona defender Ronald Araujo has a €1 billion release clause in his contract, while Real Madrid’s Federico Valverde has a similarly enormous figure attached to his deal.
Former Manchester City captain Bernardo Silva earns no less than around €10 million a year. Virgil van Dijk, who has spent eight years at Liverpool, is among the Premier League’s highest-paid players, behind only Erling Haaland in some rankings.
Bayern Munich’s 40-year-old goalkeeper Manuel Neuer earns approximately €11 million a year. Even after spending 15 years at Bayern, Neuer was criticised by supporters early in his career for kissing the club badge and singing the club anthem.
A new era is already emerging at Bayern, however.
In the German side’s first friendly of the season against Wehen, the captain’s armband was handed to 19-year-old Guido Della Rovere, who had only recently arrived from Cremonese. The young midfielder had yet to make a Bundesliga appearance and had cost just €250,000.
The contrast could hardly be greater.
A century ago, captains carried footballs towards enemy lines on battlefields. Today’s players continue to send the ball towards opposing goals, thankfully in far more peaceful circumstances.
But the changing structure of football suggests that the age of captains who are inseparable from their clubs may itself be slowly becoming a thing of the past.
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