Heir to Totti's throne: Ljajic can succeed where so many others have failed

Rarely has an Under-9s football match generated such international excitement. News of Roma’s 3-1 victory over Lazio in the Pulcini age category made headlines from Italy to Indonesia for one simple reason: Cristian Totti, son of Francesco, had scored the Giallorossi’s third goal. 

Few are the examples of great athletes whose children have gone on to emulate their achievements, but that cannot stop us from wondering at the possibilities. How talented is Cristian? What genes have been passed down from father to son? “He’s good,” said Francesco of Cristian during an interview with Vanity Fair earlier this year. “But I was better at his age.”

He was likely telling the truth, though he might also have been seeking to ease the burden of expectation on his child. Cristian only celebrated his ninth birthday last month and already it feels as though some fans are counting the days until he is old enough to represent the senior team. 

Who else, after all, could fill the void that will be left by his father? For the best part of a decade, Roma supporters have been asking how their team will cope with Totti’s eventual retirement, and whether they will ever find another player worthy of filling his shoes. 

Talented forwards have come and gone in the meantime, from Alessio Cerci through to Jérémy Ménez. Totti contended that Erik Lamela could be his natural heir, before the Argentinian was sold to Tottenham. Instead, at 38 years old, Er Pupone remains as essential to Roma as ever. 

Without him, the chances are that Roma would already have been eliminated from the Champions League. It was Totti who scored the club’s equaliser against Manchester City at the Etihad, coolly chipping Joe Hart. And it was the captain again who found the net away to CSKA Moscow, holding his nerve in a game where many team-mates failed to do so. 

Perhaps Totti will unpick City’s defence for a second time on Wednesday evening. But if not, Roma may require the help of the latest in a long line of players who have aspired to one day take over his mantle. Signed to replace Lamela last August, Adem Ljajic is finally showing signs of beginning to play up to his potential. 

A backup at the beginning of this season, Ljajic has started five games in the last month, scoring four times and providing two assists. It was he who dragged Roma back from the brink against Sassuolo on Sunday, grabbing both goals as they came from 2-0 down to snatch a draw. 

Not bad for someone who has been playing, as Totti did earlier in his career, out wide in a three-man attack. Stylistically, their approach to the role is similar, both men relying on technique and timing to outmanoeuvre opponents rather than scintillating pace. Ljajic does not get beyond the full-back as often as Gervinho or Juan Iturbe, but he is more likely than either of them to create an opportunity for a team-mate. 

The Serbian was defined by Roma’s manager, Rudi Garcia, as a “rough diamond” earlier this year. The tendency in the Italian press has been to hold up a loupe to his flaws. Ljajic is often portrayed as a footballing ne’er-do-well – the man who provoked Delio Rossi into a sideline assault at Fiorentina, and who Sinisa Mihajlovic accused of eating too much Nutella. 

But Totti himself has hardly been a model of good behaviour throughout his career. He has endured hostile relations with a number of the managers that have passed through the gates at Trigoria over the last two decades. None of it prevented Totti from working hard at his craft, and becoming one of the best in the world. 

It is far too soon to suggest that Ljajic could rise to such levels. Garcia has compared him to Eden Hazard, another perceived troublemaker who grew into an exceptional player under the manager’s guidance at Lille, but a run of five games is no basis on which to make such a comparison. 

For now Ljajic is fighting simply to keep his place in the team, although it speaks volumes that he is expected to start against City ahead of Iturbe – a man who Roma paid €22 million to acquire in the summer. 

Ljajic will be playing alongside Totti, not instead of him. But a match-winning performance on Wednesday might just be enough to make Roma’s fans forget about their captain’s son for a while.