Francesco Totti’s brief spell inside Roma’s hierarchy remains one of the unresolved chapters of the Pallotta era: a club legend moved from the pitch to the offices, only to feel increasingly excluded from decisions that shaped the team. In his new book, Oltre, the former captain recalls a period marked by frustration, internal disagreements and a decisive dispute over Javier Pastore’s arrival in 2018.
Key takeaways
- Totti says Roma initially treated him largely as a public-facing figure after his retirement in 2017.
- He felt he was allowed influence only when his view already matched that of the club’s senior executives.
- The former Roma captain opposed Pastore’s signing, believing the Argentine did not fit Eusebio Di Francesco’s 4-3-3.
- Totti preferred Roma to pursue Ajax forward Hakim Ziyech with the same investment.
- Pastore joined for €25 million on wages of €4.5 million per season and made only 14 appearances in his first campaign.
- Totti left Roma at the end of the 2018-19 season despite having two years remaining on his contract.
A place at the club without real authority
Totti, who has recently turned 50, describes his move into a director’s role as an unhappy adjustment from the moment he stopped playing. His final years as a footballer had already been strained, notably through his long-running dispute with Luciano Spalletti and the absence of a new contract in 2017. Retirement did not ease that tension with the club.
He writes that, within months of ending his playing career in the summer of 2017, he felt Roma had reduced him to an ambassadorial role. “I was becoming someone used for the image of the club, little more,” he recalls, adding that he was losing enthusiasm while sitting at home. When he did move closer to the sporting department, he says he still had no meaningful power over decisions.
In Totti’s account, he could make a choice only when it happened to coincide with the position already taken by Roma’s leading figures. The result was a growing sense of detachment from a club in which he had spent almost his entire life.
He also believed that Di Francesco, his former teammate and Roma coach in 2018-19, did not receive sufficient backing from those above him. Totti says he respected the coach, but did not see that same respect being shown within the boardroom. Their working relationships, he says, eventually broke down completely.
The Pastore meeting and Totti’s final break
The dispute that came to represent his wider disillusionment concerned Pastore’s transfer from Paris Saint-Germain. Roma convened a meeting on the proposed deal attended by Mauro Baldissoni, Monchi, Federico Balzaretti and Francesco Vallone, among others. Totti says he spoke because he felt the club deserved an honest assessment.
His objection was not personal. He says Pastore was a gifted player capable of supplying a final pass, but he did not see a natural role for him in Di Francesco’s 4-3-3. In that shape, Totti argued, the Argentine lacked the physical capacity to operate as a wide player. To accommodate him properly, Roma would need to alter the system, perhaps towards a 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-1-2.
Totti recalls Baldissoni responding that he always saw problems and was always against the club. The remark hurt him deeply. “Against Roma? Me?” was his reaction, unsure whether to laugh or cry at the accusation.
After Pastore arrived, Totti says he approached Di Francesco and was told by the coach: “Francè, I did not ask for him.” Totti then returned to the executives, urging them not to leave the manager exposed in a city where pressure can quickly consume a coach. He felt the leadership group was not united, describing meetings in which people spoke badly about others and wondering what was said about him when he was absent.
The disagreement was also tied to an alternative Totti favoured. Rather than spend the money on Pastore, he would have targeted Ziyech, then thriving at Ajax. Ziyech later moved to Chelsea, where he won the Champions League, UEFA Super Cup and Club World Cup.
Pastore’s Roman spell did not vindicate the investment. Signed for €25 million and earning €4.5 million a year, he played 14 matches in his first season, followed by 11 in the next and then five more amid recurring injury problems. His contract was eventually terminated after José Mourinho excluded him from the squad.
For Totti, the episode became part of the case for walking away. At the end of that season, he left Roma and later aired his grievances at his well-known CONI press conference. He says he surrendered two remaining years of his contract because he was too direct, and too honest in his dealings, to continue within that structure.
