Former Croatian captain Niko Kovac is retiring from football, his Austrian club Red Bull Salzburg announced on its website Friday.
The 37-year-old midfielder, who already announced his international retirement in January after winning 83 caps and scoring 15 goals between 1996 and 2008, will hang up his shirt at the end of the current Austrian league season, the club said.
Kovac will play his last game in a friendly match against his former team Bayern Munich on July 10 in Salzburg.
The Croatian captained his national side from 2004 onwards, participating in the European Championship in Portugal in 2004 and in Austria and Switzerland in 2008, as well as the World Cup in Germany in 2006.
He joined Salzburg in 2006, winning two Austrian league titles with the Austrian club.
Before that, Kovac spent most of his career in the German Bundesliga, playing with Hertha Berlin, Bayer Leverkusen, Hamburg and Bayern Munich, with whom he won the German league title in 2003.
