Eden Hazard: Jose Mourinho Predicted Belgian’s Early Retirement with Warning 8 Years Ago

• Jose Mourinho was spot on with his prediction on the trajectory of Eden Hazard’s career back in 2014
• Hazard announced his retirement from football on Tuesday, October 10
• A series of injury problems while at Real Madrid slowly led to the Belgian’s decline

Jose Mourinho’s sentiments expressing concern over Eden Hazard’s career from eight years ago have resurfaced following the Belgian’s retirement announcement.

Hazard called it quits on a lucrative football career on Tuesday, October 10, after his contract at Real Madrid was ripped up.

The Belgian joined Los Blancos in 2019 from Chelsea for £89m, but ended up making just 54 appearances for the Spanish giants.

His dip in form and favour among the various Real Madrid bosses was largely due to persistent injury problems.

In his statement, Hazard said he felt it was the right time to hang his boots, saying, as per the BBC:

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"You must listen to yourself and say stop at the right time."

His announcement came 10 months after he also retired from international football. He was part of the Belgium squad that was knocked out of the 2022 World Cup in the group stage.

Mourinho’s disheartening prediction

Interestingly, one person who may have possibly foreseen Hazard’s early retirement was his former boss, Jose Mourinho.

Mourinho was critical of the lack of protection players like Hazard were accorded, as the Belgian emerged as one of the most fouled players in the Premier League.

Speaking at a press conference in 2014, Mourinho said, as per SportBible:

"People [are] in love with football in this country; people must be in love with Eden Hazard.

"The way, match after match, he's being punished by opponents and he's not being protected by referees, maybe one day we don't have Eden Hazard.

"It's one, two, three, four, five, 10 aggressive fouls against him. They kick and kick and kick, and the kid resists."

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Mourinho noted that Hazard was an “honest guy”, and rarely went down on the first contact, making opponents kick at him more.

7 other stars who retired too early

Sports Brief also reported on several other football stars who hung up their boots a bit too early.

Among those players include Zinedine Zidane, Eric Cantona, and three-time Ballon d’Or winner Michel Platini.