The revelation of the ownership’s openness to Totti’s return came from Claudio Ranieri, and it already carries the feel of something close to official.
In Rome, since yesterday, there has been talk of nothing else. It all started with a line from Claudio Ranieri during an interview with Sky Sport: “Totti in the club? The Friedkins are thinking about it. I hope he can be useful to Roma: Francesco is part of Roma.”
Too shrewd a club man not to know that such a statement would unleash a storm, and that is exactly what happened.
Before Ranieri reopened a topic in the city that had long been considered closed, there had been no recent signs of a possible return of the No. 10 to the club’s hierarchy after his 2019 exit.
In fact, in an interview in March 2024, Totti himself had shut the door firmly with a line that left no room for interpretation: “The Friedkins don’t want me at Roma.”
Ranieri’s words were not accidental: they triggered a chain reaction that can only end with the official announcement of Francesco Totti’s return home, meaning to his Roma.
What remains to be defined is the role, which cannot be that of a mere flag-bearer or symbolic figure, because Totti himself left in 2019 accusing the then Pallotta-led American ownership of not giving him an operational role.
So Totti will be a Roma executive, but with what responsibilities? And why has president Dan Friedkin decided to bring him back precisely now?
To fully understand the context, a brief historical digression is needed.
The Friedkins’ American ownership currently does not enjoy great popularity in Rome, despite the millions of euros invested over the years.
The dismissal of Mourinho, seen by the fanbase as a representative leader, in January 2024 opened the first major rift between the American ownership and Roma supporters. Above all because Mourinho had embodied the fans after the Europa League Final lost in 2023, while Friedkin had not.
The appointment of De Rossi to the Roma bench, called in to replace the Special One, initially felt to many like a populist move, but Daniele delivered on the pitch and earned a renewal, even a three-year one.
However, only a few months after that extension, at the start of the new 2024/25 season, the Friedkins also surprisingly sacked Daniele De Rossi, opening a new and definitive breach in their relationship with the fans.
This, in very broad terms, is the backdrop. In a short space of time, Dan Friedkin went from being an idolized president after the 2022 Conference League triumph—when hundreds of thousands of people chanted his name (along with Mourinho’s) during the open-top bus parade through the city—to being openly contested.
Having already played, and played rather badly given the outcome, the De Rossi card, today Friedkin was left with only one last move to try to reconnect with the fanbase: Francesco Totti.
The most likely (and desirable) scenario is that Totti becomes an executive within the technical area, a support figure for the squad and the head coach as well as for the Sporting Director, especially in the difficult task of identifying the right young players to integrate into the roster.
Roma, as Claudio Ranieri reiterated in the Sky interview, are committed to a project that on paper is ambitious but sustainable, in which the ability to select, launch, and develop the right young players—also with an eye on future capital gains—will be decisive.
What better eye than Francesco Totti’s to unearth new talent or to understand which profiles can be technically functional for the club’s present and future project?
With Totti, the Friedkins are clearly going all-in: either they bring the fans back on side, or they lose them for good.
L’articolo The Friedkins want to bring Totti back to Roma proviene da Soccer Made In Italy.
