Why Always Me? - The Biography of Mario Balotelli, City's Legendary Striker. Frank Worrall
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This book is dedicated to the following:
IN ENGLAND – Loyal Manchester City fans Craig
Bodell and Caroline Sterling, and journalist Howard
Cooper of the Sun.
IN ITALY – Journalist Nick Pisa, to whom I am indebted for providing all the background and early life material on Mario from birth to 15, particularly for Nick’s interviews with the family, close friends and associates of the footballer back in Italy.
The initial profits I make from this book are funding my 14-year-old son Frankie’s humanitarian trip to Uganda to help underprivileged orphans by teaching in schools, helping to grow crops and building facilities in the local area – causes I know are close to Mario Balotelli’s heart.
For more details on Frank Worrall and his books see www.frankworrall.com
‘Balotelli is the greatest living human being ever. He is not of this world. If he played for any other club, we’d still love him.’
Rocker and Manchester City fanatic
Noel Gallagher on his favourite footballer.
CONTENTS
Title Page
Dedication
Epigraph
Acknowledgements
CHAPTER 1: A TROUBLED BOY
CHAPTER 2: INTER THE BIG TIME
CHAPTER 3: MOURINHO MAYHEM
CHAPTER 4: MANCINI – THE SURROGATE FATHER
CHAPTER 5: KISSED BY GOOD FORTUNE
CHAPTER 6: WELCOME TO MANCHESTER
CHAPTER 7: BOY BLUE
CHAPTER 8: GOLDEN YEAR
CHAPTER 9: BANNER HEADLINES
CHAPTER 10: END OF THE HURT
CHAPTER 11: ITALIAN STALLIONS
CHAPTER 12: SEEING RED
CHAPTER 13: CITY’S CANTONA
CHAPTER 14: JUST CHAMPION
CHAPTER 15: FACT AND FICTION
Plates
Copyright
Special thanks: Nick Pisa in Rome, John Blake, Allie Collins and all at John Blake Publishing. Alan Feltham and the boys at SunSport, and Dominic Turnbull.
THANKS: Gary Edwards, Adrian Baker, Ben Felsenburg, Alex Butler, Danny Bottono, Steven Gordon, Lee Clayton, BBC Sport, Dave Morgan, Darren O’Driscoll, David and Nicki Burgess, Pravina Patel, Martin Creasy, Lee Hassall, Ian Rondeau, Colin Forshaw, John Fitzpatrick, Roy Stone, Russell Forgham and Tom Henderson Smith.
Not forgetting: Angela, Frankie, Jude, Nat, Barbara, Frank, Bob and Stephen, Gill, Lucy, Alex, Suzanne, Michael and William.
His childhood certainly was no easy ride. He would suffer from health problems and poverty – and would eventually end up living with foster parents. His troubled childhood would be a key factor in moulding his character and the person he would become as a footballer and would certainly contribute to the insecurities, defensiveness and pained psyche that would plague him as he became an international star.
Mario Barwuah Balotelli was born on August 12, 1990, in Palermo, Sicily, to Ghanaian immigrants Thomas and Rose Barwuah. They were poor and Mario lived in cramped accommodation with his parents and his sister Abigail, three years his elder. Thomas proved he would graft for his family by travelling back and forth every weekend on a 12-hour overnight train to find manual work, many miles away from their home. Rose stayed at home to look after Mario and Abigail. But Rose and Thomas faced further problems as Mario was in and out of hospital for the first two years of his life. He was diagnosed with life-threatening complications to his intestines shortly after birth, and would need a series of operations.
Thomas said, ‘There were complications with Mario’s intestines and he was in a bad way. The doctors were worried that he would not survive and we even had him baptised in hospital in case he died. For a year we were frantic with worry that he would not live. He was our first-born son and we were so proud when he was born, but we were left facing the prospect he might die.’
But Mario was a born fighter and by the age of two his condition had improved dramatically. The family now moved to Bagnolo on the outskirts of Brescia in northern Italy. They were still poor and initially lived in a cramped studio flat with another African family before asking social services for help, pointing out Mario had recently recovered from an operation.
Social services officers sympathised with their plight – and suggested that it might be for the best if Mario moved in with foster parents. The officers thought Mario would benefit if he went to live with Francesco and Silvio Balotelli, a white couple who already had two sons and a daughter of their own. Francesco, a warehouse supervisor in the pasta trade (now retired) and Silvio, originally a nurse and then a foster mother through much of her married life, lived in a big house in Concesio, an affluent nearby town, and social services pointed out to the Barwuahs that the move would bring stability and comfort to their son, who had suffered so much with his failing health.
Thomas Barwuah said: ‘At first we were not sure but we decided it was probably best for Mario. We saw him every week and we all got on really well.’
Soon the Barwuahs moved to a council flat above a row of shops – and, two years after Mario was born, had another son, Enoch, who would also become a professional footballer. Thomas said he and his wife had agreed to a one-year foster placement, which was then extended by a further 12 months. But a division was opening up which would prove impossible to heal.
Thomas said, ‘We thought that at some point, once things had sorted out, Mario would come back to us. But instead, every time we tried to get him back, the Balotellis kept extending the foster time. We couldn’t afford lawyers to fight for us, so Mario grew more and more distant.
‘He would come and visit and play with his brothers and sisters but he just didn’t seem to have any time for us, his mother and father. We wanted him back for more than 10 years but, every time we tried, the courts blocked it.’
Instead Mario was brought up by the Balotellis. Even inside a well-off family he suffered at times – being the black child of white parents. It would lead him to turning his back on his Ghanaian heritage, taking the surname of his adopted parents and eventually becoming an Italian national. Inevitably, he would suffer racial abuse at school and in the street as he grew up with the Balotellis and would become ‘both introverted and combustible’ according to those who witnessed his development. His foster