Kroos and the idea of ​​retiring at 34: what do athletes do after hanging up their boots?

Retire at 34 years old. Surely more than one person has wanted it when hearing the alarm clock ring at dawn. This is what Toni Kroos is going to do, as announced last week. The Madrid player has decided to hang up his boots, after 10 seasons at the white club, once he finishes the Euro Cup being played this summer in his home country. He thus complies with his idea of ​​leaving when he is still at the peak of his career, and not extend it in a lower level competition, but with better pay, in some rich emirate. His most immediate future plans, as he has said, are linked to football, through an academy with his name in Madrid in which boys and girls are taught to play, as well as a league in Germany similar to the Kings League, which he promoted in Spain another former player, Gerard Piqué, along with the content creator Ibai Llanos.

The still Madrid fan also founded Kroos Properties XXI in 2020, a company for the promotion and rental of properties, among other purposes. Brick, in fact, is one of the preferred options for former athletes to invest in. “You don’t have to dedicate so much time and attention to the real estate sector at a time in your career when you are focused on competition and resting to have the best performance,” says Aitor Ocio. He speaks from experience, since as an active footballer he founded the ABU promotion group together with Jesús Vera, current president of the firm.

The former Sevilla FC and Athletic Bilbao player has recently joined forces with Colliers to launch the Sports & Estates service line. The aim is to advise professional athletes, and people around them, on their real estate investments. “Sometimes a wrong decision can be a burden for a long time. That is why we offer them, free of charge and informative, that they can listen to professionals,” explains Ocio, which currently has among its businesses an aesthetic medicine center, a spa and a luxury canning company, Roi&Co.

Eric Sánchez also found his occupation in brick when he left the basketball courts, after his time with teams such as Caja San Fernando or Obradoiro. But in his case he has combined it with technology, thanks to his career in Computer Engineering, and has founded Reental, a company dedicated to the tokenization of real estate. That is, the firm buys buildings, gives them a value and divides them into digital shares, or tokens, to sell to investors, who receive a return for the economic rights derived from the exploitation of the property, but who are not owners of it. For now, it has 16,000 users from 81 countries, according to data provided by the firm.

imposter syndrome

“The reality is that real estate in Spain is linked to anyone with some money, who the first thing they think about is investing in brick. It is the investment that we all know,” says Sánchez. She acknowledges that he started “out of obligation.” “Who was I going to ask for a job? What was he going to tell him, that he was a good team player? You look outside the real world,” he adds, before stating that he felt what is known as imposter syndrome when he started in the business world, and went from “wearing a tracksuit all day to wearing a jacket.” And he compares the “optimism” that an entrepreneur must have with that of a player. “An athlete at the level that I have played must be optimistic, because we have a contract every year, which means that it depends on how you play, it is decided where you will be the following season and how much you are going to earn. So either you are optimistic, or you put away your sneakers.”

The feeling of being an imposter that Sánchez speaks of was also experienced by Jorge Garbajosa, president of FIBA ​​Europe, although he compares it to being “a stowaway.” The champion of the 2006 Japan Basketball World Cup with the Spanish team maintains that the image of “perfect men and women” that athletes can have helps “very little in the transition” after retirement. “They see you playing on the court and they automatically say ‘how nice, how he works, how he tries hard, but he only knows how to play basketball.’ Many times companies or the ecosystem outside of basketball see us as nice people who do not have that fang that society demands. Breaking with that image is complicated.”

Both Garbajosa and Sánchez claim that during a sports career they acquire skills that companies require today, such as leadership and teamwork. “You don’t need to read books about it or take a course, we have already learned it,” defends the former Real Madrid and Unicaja player.

What all those interviewed agree on is the importance of training when it comes to being prepared to face a life away from competition, as well as the difficulties encountered by athletes who want to have it.

Sánchez says that he started studying telecommunications engineering, “but it could only be done in person,” and when he started playing professionally, he didn’t know which city he was going to live in each year. “I switched to Computer Science because it was the only engineering I could do at Uned. I wanted to have a career when I finished. It is true that in Spain it is not easy. In fact, I was about to go to the United States, where playing at university is combined with studies. But I started to be a professional and I stayed.”

Leisure was also forced to leave his Humanities and Business studies at the University of Deusto, due to the lack of facilities to combine classes and exams with matches and training, in “years that are fundamental.” “There was no help to, for example, take an exam on another date. It was a lot of effort to not reach a goal in the end, which generates frustration and in the end leads to abandonment,” says the player, who has “a thorn in his side” for not having finished the race. So that history does not repeat itself, his daughter, who also plays soccer, will continue his academic training in the United States. “The model there is an example. Between the ages of 18 and 22, the athlete has the opportunity to both compete and study at a very high level. He allows them to complete their studies, without having to abandon the sport. And then be able to continue, if the circumstances arise, as a professional.”

Garbajosa, president of FIBA ​​Europe, assures that among the new generations of athletes they are “much more aware” about the importance of training for the future, and that clubs and organizations are helping them. He gives as examples the ACB and Johan Cruyff Institute program for Endesa League players to acquire business, marketing and financial knowledge, as well as the Wilead and Time Out initiatives, promoted by FIBA.

“Preparing yourself allows you to make better decisions and have more chances of success, although it does not guarantee it 100%. What is a guarantee is that a bad decision is almost a recipe for failure,” says Luis Scola, former player of the NBA Houston Rockets and current CEO of the Italian Varese Basket. Based on his experience, he defends that “it is very difficult” to dedicate several
hours a day to thinking about the future when you have to be “one hundred percent” focused on your sports career. “The normal thing is that at 18 kids go to university, train, do things as young people, get educated, grow, start working and progress in their careers. When they are in positions of responsibility, 15 years have passed and that is when the money, opportunities and decisions arrive. In sports it is the opposite. All this comes first, and when you are mentally prepared and mature, that is when the race is over.”

Sometimes, this end is more hasty than expected, due, for example, to an injury. For this reason, Ocio advocates always having “an alternative, a plan b. It doesn’t have to be a career, but it does have to be some concerns. Not everyone has the skills to be a coach, which is one of the natural outlets.” And he reiterates in his defense of “not abandoning studies”, especially those who in categories such as cadet or youth “already have representatives and their heads are clouded”, since “there are few who reach the elite.”

Follow all the information Five days in Facebook, x and Linkedinor in our newsletter Five Day Agenda

_