Why I missed Mario
Last week, I read a very amusing story about one of Jose Mourinho’s experiences with football’s ‘problem child’ Mario Balotelli and I just could not resist sharing it with you. It is a charming story behind a red card that was shown to Balotelli while both were at Inter.
In an interview with CNN, the now Chelsea boss spoke of the challenges in managing enigma Balotelli who has just joined Liverpool and here it goes: “I could write a book of 200 pages of my two years at Inter with Mario, but the book would not be a drama – it would be a comedy,” noted Mourinho.
“I remember one time when we went to play Kazan in the Champions League. In that match, I had all my strikers injured. No Diego Milito, no Samuel Eto’o, I was really in trouble and Mario was the only one. Mario got a yellow card in the 42nd minute, so when I got to the dressing room at half-time I spent about 14 minutes of the 15 available speaking only to Mario.
“I said to him: ‘Mario, I cannot change you, I have no strikers on the bench, so don’t touch anybody and play only with the ball. If we lose the ball no reaction. If someone provokes you, no reaction, if the referee makes a mistake, no reaction. But you know what happened?—46th minute (just a minute into the second half) – red card”.
Perhaps that is why I, and perhaps many others, are happy that Balotelli is back in the premiership; Mario’s funny antics are part of the game and that is what I missed. Boy, oh boy!
On a serious note though, my beloved Flames will set about their 2015 Africa Cup of Nations qualification campaign against Mali away in Bamako this weekend. On paper, the Eagles are favourites. Afterall, they boast one of the best players to emerge from the continent—Seydou Keita—who starred for Barcelona and now plays for AS Roma in Italy.
It is a contest that is weighed heavily in favour of Mali and the only similarities are that apart from ‘w’, we share all the letters in the names of our respective countries. We will not lose anything to concede that we are going into a fight against a better opponent in its own den, but such is the beauty of football that it has given us countless examples of men and women who went into the battlefield with the odds heavily stacked against them, but emerged but triumphant. Go Flames! Go! Glory be to God. Uloliwe.uloliwe wayidudula hii…neng’asiza [The train is pushing].
