The weird pattern of departing legends in Serie A scoring during their respective farewells continued on Sunday evening, as 38-year-old Udinese striker Antonio Di Natale netted in his final ever game.
Di Natale is Udinese's record appearance holder and goalscorer in Serie A, with 189 goals in 362 appearances since he joined from Empoli in 2004. He is also the 6th highest goalscorer in Serie A, and with 307 goals in all competitions, the 8th highest-scoring Italian of all time.
And most of it arrived after the age of 30. In fact, Di Natale scored more goals after the big 'three-oh' than Christian Vieri, Filippo Inzaghi and Hernan Crespo managed in their entire careers.
He's currently unsure as to whether he'll play on when he departs Udinese in the summer, although retirement seems likely. But he did at least sign off with a goal from the spot in their 2-1 home defeat to Carpi.
If it seems slightly odd that we'd bring you this news, you may perhaps not be aware as to the sheer magnitude of 'Toto' Di Natale as one of football's truly colossal characters.
Italian football was briefly suspended in April 2012 after a young Udinese midfielder tragically died on the pitch while on loan at Livorno. Piermario Morosini was just 25 years old, and left behind his severely disabled sister who had unfortunately already lost both of her parents in the past 10 years. It was striker and captain Di Natale who stepped up to the mark, announcing that he would take guardianship of his late teammate's sister, whilst assuring that she would receive all the financial aid and care that her brother had worked so hard to provide her with.
An unbelievable man, and one of the most transcendent characters in Italian football as a result. Even as far back as 2010, Di Natale rejected a move to Juventus because his children had grown up in Udine and his family enjoyed living there.
Of course, he also did things like this:
