Angel Di Maria has pulled out of a planned return to boyhood club Rosario Central after receiving a death threat aimed at his daughter.
The former Manchester United winger is a free agent after leaving Benfica at the end of last season and had his heart set on a return to his native Argentina to play for Rosario.
But he said that is no longer a possibility due to the threat of violence against his family.
He told Rosario’s Canal 3: “There was a threat carried out in my parents’ neighborhood which became public and at the same time another one at my sister’s property which didn’t come to light because my sister and my brother-in-law were scared and did not report it.
“It was a box with a pig’s head and a bullet in the forehead, and a note that said that if I went back to Central, the next head was my daughter Pía’s.”
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Di Maria, who retired from international football earlier this month after helping Argentina win the Copa America, said he told Rosario president Gonzalo Belloso of his decision not to return in March.
He added: “I told them I wasn’t going to say anything until after the Copa but my first ‘no’ was on March 25. Belloso kept trying but it wasn’t due to anything economic or sporting [that the move didn’t happen]. It was more than that, there were threats to my family that overcame everything.
“Seeing my daughter’s name on that note in the box they sent surpassed everything.
“They were horrible times when we thought and cried every night that we wouldn’t be able to fulfil the dream.”
The 36-year-old, who spent two years at Rosario before leaving for Benfica in 2007 and then enjoying spells at Real Madrid, Manchester United, Paris Saint-Germain and Juventus, is still hoping the move will take place at some stage, though. He said: “I said it and I’m going to say it a thousand more times: I want to retire at Central. It’s my dream and that of my family to come back.”
