The Belgian forward Dries Mertens, the all-time top scorer for Napoli, has officially announced his retirement from football at the age of 38, following the end of his contract with Turkish club Galatasaray.

Mertens made the announcement through a video directed to his former Napoli teammate, Slovak Marek Hamšík, who is organizing a friendly match early next month, stating: "I will retire from football, but I will wear my shoes for the last time for you."

Mertens had a distinguished career with Napoli that lasted 9 seasons, during which he scored 148 goals in 397 matches, before moving to Galatasaray in the summer of 2022, where he won three Turkish league titles, in addition to one cup and one super cup.

Mertens joined Napoli in 2011 from Dutch club PSV Eindhoven, and he won the Coppa Italia twice with the team in 2014 and 2020, as well as the Italian Super Cup in 2014.

On the international level, Mertens participated in 109 matches with the Belgium national team, scoring 21 goals, with his last international appearance being in the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.