Having admitted during the week he would 'definitely' consider playing past the age of 45, Tom Brady confirmed on Sunday night that he has no intentions of calling time on his career just yet.
"We're coming back, you already know that," said the Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback as he celebrated clinching his seventh career Super Bowl ring following the team's 31-9 victory over the Kansas City Chiefs.
Head coach Bruce Arians also reassured Bucs fans of his return by again shutting down speculation he could retire for a second time, following on from his brief spell away from the league in 2018, while tight end Rob Gronkowski stated he 'didn't see any reason' why he wouldn't be back next season having come out of retirement last year to reunite with Brady in Tampa.
Brady finished Sunday night's game 21 of 28 passing for 201 yards and three touchdowns, two of which went to Gronkowski to make them the most prolific scoring combination in playoff history. The 43-year-old also picked up his fifth Super Bowl MVP award while making his 10th appearance in the league's showpiece game.
It capped a remarkable first year in Tampa after Brady had arrived in the offseason on the back of 20 seasons with the New England Patriots. A new Conference, a new team and a virtual offseason followed but Brady was still able to lead his team on an eight-game winning run from November that culminated in Sunday's title success in their own stadium.
Across from Brady, Todd Bowles' defensive unit starred for the Bucs, swarming a weakened Chiefs offensive line to take advantage of an unusually-uninspiring Kansas City offense and inflict a bruising outing on quarterback Patrick Mahomes, who failed to throw a single touchdown pass.
"Being down here and experiencing it this with this group of guys, every year is amazing, and this team is world champions forever, you cant take that away from us, so thank you guys, thank you all," said Brady post-game.
"Everything we dealt with all year, we had a rough month of November, but BA (Bruce Arians) had all the confidence in us. The team had a lot of confidence. We came together at the right time. I think we knew this was going to happen tonight, didn't we? We ended up playing our best game of the year."
If his legacy as the greatest ever hadn't already been cemented, it certainly is now.