{"id":48196,"date":"2023-03-23T11:18:38","date_gmt":"2023-03-23T11:18:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2023\/03\/23\/ozil-quits-football\/"},"modified":"2023-03-23T11:18:38","modified_gmt":"2023-03-23T11:18:38","slug":"ozil-quits-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2023\/03\/23\/ozil-quits-football\/","title":{"rendered":"Ozil Quits Football &#8211;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p><strong> Mesut Ozil<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Former Real Madrid and Arsenal midfielder, Mesut Ozil, has announced his retirement from professional football at age 34.<\/p>\n<p>Ozil, who was part of Germany\u2019s World Cup-winning squad in 2014, has spent the past three seasons in the Turkish Super Lig and retires after making four league appearances for Basaksehir, who he joined as a free agent last year.<\/p>\n<p>He retired from international duty in 2018 amid a political debate in Germany about an influx of migrants and after backlash over a photograph taken with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, saying he faced \u201cracism and disrespect\u201d over his Turkish ancestry.<\/p>\n<p>The midfielder made 645 career appearances for club and country, including 254 for Arsenal across a seven-year stint. He featured in the club\u2019s FA Cup finals in 2014, 2015 and 2017, helping his side to victory in all three Wembley matches.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAfter thoughtful consideration, I\u2019m announcing my immediate retirement from professional football,\u201d Ozil wrote in an announcement posted to Twitter.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ve had the privilege to be a professional football player for almost 17 years now and I feel incredibly thankful for the opportunity. But in recent weeks and months, having also suffered some injuries, it\u2019s become more and more clear that it\u2019s time to leave the big stage of football.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt has been an amazing journey filled with unforgettable moments and emotions. I want to thank my clubs \u2013 Schalke, Werder Bremen, Real Madrid, Arsenal FC, Fenerbah\u00e7e, Basaksehir and the coaches who supported me, plus teammates who have become friends.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSpecial thanks must go to my family members and my closest friends. They have been a part of my journey from day one and have given me so much love and support, through the good times and the bad.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><!-- AI CONTENT END 2 -->\n\t<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mesut Ozil Former Real Madrid and Arsenal midfielder, Mesut Ozil, has announced his retirement from professional football at age 34. Ozil, who was part of Germany\u2019s World Cup-winning squad in 2014, has spent the past three seasons in the Turkish Super Lig and retires after making four league appearances for Basaksehir, who he joined as [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48197,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Ozil Quits Football - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2023\/03\/23\/ozil-quits-football\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Ozil Quits Football - Ghanamma.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Mesut Ozil Former Real Madrid and Arsenal midfielder, Mesut Ozil, has announced his retirement from professional football at age 34. 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