Carlos Tevez all smiles after leaving China as he admits ‘it’s much easier if I’m happy’ back at Boca
The Argentine striker says he has ‘no regrets’ about lucrative but injury-marred season in Chinese Super League with Shanghai Shenhua
.png?itok=arIb17P0)
Having joined Shanghai Shenhua in January last year on an estimated €730,000-a-week (US$871.328) salary, making him one of the world’s highest-paid players, it may explain his comment when Carlos Tevez reflected on returning to Boca Juniors: “As I won, I also lost.”
But Tevez will be happy to settle for just playing after a lucrative but ultimately miserable 12 months with the Chinese Super League club.
“I’m fine. It’s much easier if I’m happy and I’m happy,” Tevez said at his boyhood club’s training ground just outside Buenos Aires.
The striker scored only four goals in the Chinese Super League during an injury-marred season in which he missed the Chinese FA Cup final, which his team won.
“I have no regrets. When I made the decision [to go to China] I took it knowing the consequences,” he said.
Boca chairman Daniel Angelici said no money changed hands in bringing Tevez back to his former club.
“I want to thank the Chinese club because it has made it easier for Carlos to be here with us. There was no economic compensation, neither from Boca to the Chinese club nor from China to Boca,” Angelici said.
Tevez said: “We went hand in hand with the Chinese club. Boca did not have to put anything in.”
Tevez hopes to turn back the clock and use his return to Boca Juniors as a springboard to get back in the Argentina team for this year’s World Cup in Russia.
The former Manchester United and Juventus striker – who turns 34 next month – last played for the national side in October 2015.
“I have a few years of football left, being in a World Cup for a player of my age would be something very nice,” he said.
Tevez’s main goal now is to win the South American Copa Libertadores club championship with six-time winners Boca. The Buenos Aires club last won it in 2007.
“We all know the responsibility of playing a Libertadores. I think it’s time to try to take that weight off us and win it,” he said.
