Mario Balotelli: the facts & the fiction

Not since the days of Eric Cantona has a player earned such a reputation for eccentricity and outrageous behaviour. But how much of what we're told about Mario Balotelli is actually true? Using my own experiences working on national newspapers I've taken a careful look through all the stories written about him since his move to City in order to figure out how much of it appears true, and how much is media creation.

But first, it's helpful to take a look at how Balotelli first hit the headlines during his time at Inter.

Balotelli entered the consciousness of the Italian public in April 2009, after he was racially abused by Juventus fans during a match in Turin. Italian football authorities condemned the chants and imposed sanctions on the club, but to little effect. The abuse continued - Balotelli was targeted with chants such as: "There's no such thing as an Italian negro" - questions were asked in the Italian parliament, and by the 2009-10 season the case had become a symbol for Italian race relations.

Although seemingly let down by the lack of support from Inter manager Jose Mourinho, it should be noted that Mario's behaviour during the latter part of the 09-10 season didn't exactly build bridges. On 1st April he was forced to issue an apology to fans after he wore an AC Milan shirt during a television show and admitted he was a boyhood Milan fan. Three weeks later the situation had broken down beyond repair. At the end of a Champions League win against Barcelona, Balotelli threw his shirt away in anger after being jeered by Inter fans, who were unhappy at his performance after coming off the bench. According to Barcalona's Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Balotelli was then physically attacked by Inter's Marco Materazzi.

The following month Balotelli was again at the centre of the race issue. During the Coppa Italia final, Francesco Totti was sent off after he chased Balotelli for about 25 yards before wildly kicking him in the back of the leg (video of the incident here). Balotelli claimed that Totti also called him a "nigger piece of shit", a claim Totti denied.

                                The origins of "Mad Mario"

Up to this point Balotelli's wider fame was largely based around these race incidents. But the beginnings of his transformation into "Mad Mario" began with a story in Italy's La Repubblica on 27th June 2010, which claimed that Balotelli had been given a police warning after being part of a group who were playing with a toy gun in a Milan piazza. On 30th June Chelsea manager Carlos Ancelotti called him a "crazy talent" (though looking at the quote in context he doesn't appear to be having a dig at the player). In August 2010, shortly after joining City, he crashed his high-performance car, joining the likes of Anderson and Ronaldo in demonstrating that performance cars and young drivers are are not a good mix (Mario later admitted he shouldn't have ignored his parents advice about getting a car with right-hand drive).

Then in October came the story that he had "broken into" a women's prison. The reality though was rather more mundane. According to one of the officers at the prison, Balotelli and his brother had driven through the open front gates of the prison, not realising they needed special permission. After checking the identities of the pair they were allowed to drive away. "At the end they both appeared a bit frightened," the prison officer remarked.

But the media was now rubbing its hands with glee that such a goldmine of entertainment had arrived at what was now the most talked-about club in the country. A sending off during his second game at West Brom, and a few critical comments by Mancini in January soon added to his "bad boy" reputation.

But it was the sending-off on 17th March against Dynamo Kiev that ignited the mass of inflammable material that had been building up around him for months. That moment of hot-headedness was to transform "temperamental" Balotelli into "Mad Mario". And you'll probably not be shocked to discover that the driving force behind it was The Sun newspaper.

On 25th March the paper ran an exclusive, which it headlined He's Ballooney. The story claimed that, whilst dining at a posh restaurant, Balotelli had verbally taunted Jenny Thompson - a prostitute who's only claim to fame is that she had slept with Wayne Rooney - and tried to start a fight with Thompson's male companion.

'Horrified diners heard the £180,000-a-week ace chant "Rooney, Rooney" after spotting Jenny coming back from the ladies...Balotelli then burst out laughing and flicked the finger at Jenny's friends'. Sam Birch, a 20-year-old "property developer", valiently came to Thompson's defence, demanding Balotelli step outside. "He was acting crazy. I think he is unhinged," the Burberry cap-wearing Birch added.

A cock and bull story?

The two sources quoted in the story don't exactly shout "credibility". Jenny Thompson is a person clinging for dear life to the bottom rung of the celebrity ladder, while Sam Birch (pictured left) posts semi-naked pictures of himself on the Netlog social networking site. Birch is certainly a popular guy though. According to his Netlog profile he has 166 friends and all of them appear to be "babes".

          How tabloids work


Now at this point I'd like to go into a bit of detail about how the editorial process works on British tabloids.

The "Ballooney" story was written by Sun news reporter Richard Moriarty, who specialises in footballer-related shockers. And you don't need to be a Sherlock Holmes to figure out where this particular Moriarty got his story from. The previous day Moriarty had written another story about Thompson, revealing she was planning to attend Ladies' Day at Ascot, where Coleen Rooney would also be present. "They're not looking for confrontation," a friend told The Sun: "They just love horses" (a few months earlier Coleen Rooney had complained about Thompson repeatedly turning up at the same venues as her). He's also penned the stories Rooney hooker and the Toon star (Nov 2010), Rooney vice girl ‘in OD’ (11th June) and Rooney vice girl rescued from fire (15th June).

Before tabloid journalists write a contentious story about a celebrity they ask one all-important question: "Does the celebrity sue?" Ryan Giggs, for instance, is known to never sue. In fact, he has always refused to have any dealings with the press whatsoever (a search though his stories at Journalisted reveals that Moriarty has written 13 Ryan Giggs-related stories, including eight in eight days between 6th-14th June).

Mario, it appears, does not sue. Nor is he on the books of a big agency that can trade a story like the restaurant one away (you can find details about how this process works in Tabloid tales: how Micah got screwed). Better still, Mario has an unfortunate habit of attracting the limelight at just the wrong time. Indeed, three days after this story appeared came the darts incident.

It's important to note that no firms details have ever emerged about the darts incident, and certainly nothing to suggest that he was endangering anyone at the club. Although the lack of a denial suggests that something did take place it should also be noted that there is no record of Mario being fined over it. However, it did create the appearance of a man spinning out of control, one that the Cup semi-final incident on 17th April did little to dispel.

Then came two stories from The Sun's showbiz column, Bizarre. Although both showed him in a positive light, they also cemented his image as a mad-cap eccentric. Now, there's one thing you need to keep in mind when reading a story in the showbiz section of a tabloid newspaper: it's probably bullshit. The reason I know this is that, for roughly five years, I sat next to the showbiz desk on a British tabloid.

There are many stories I could recall, but I'll pick just one.

A showbiz writer had returned from a film premiere attended by Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. He'd posed for a quick photo with Cruise and had written up a short piece along the lines of "here's me and my good mate Tom Cruise" (a technique first used by Piers Morgan during his early days as a Sun showbiz reporter which, initially, was very tongue-in-cheek). His boss, though, was unimpressed with his efforts. "Here, I'll show you how to write a story," he said. He then proceeded to write a few hundred words of total fiction, complete with strong hints of an affair between the writer and Kidman - including jealous glances from Cruise - which culminated with an irate Cruise pulling his wife away from his "love-rival". The story became a page lead in the main news section - and both journalists have since gone on to better things.

Mario's first appearance in the Bizarre column came on 20th April, with a story claiming he had given money to a tramp following a casino win. I'll be generous and give them the benefit of the doubt on that one, as it's a story that at least could be true. But the Bizarre story on 10th May claiming he had helped a kid who was being bullied really doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Neither the boy nor the school are named, and questions such as "why did a headmaster completely disregard guidelines to invite a single man into his school who has no connection with any of his pupils?" remain unanswered.

However, by this time Balotelli had been confirmed as Britain's No1 eccentric, buffoon and bad boy. Even the Guardian said so. Indeed, "Mad" Mario was soon to develop Mafia connections though, rather like the prison episode, the incident appears to be born out of mere curiosity.

Either side of the Mario Mafia story came two incidents that probably tell us more about Balotelli's personality and lifestyle than anything else. First came his showboating antics against the LA Galaxy, which rightly earned the scorn of his manager - and the adoration of fans. Then came the infamous fireworks incident. It's important to note Balotelli's explanation of events:

"I didn’t set any fireworks off, it was a friend of mine. I didn’t know anything about it until I heard the shouting coming from the bathroom. 'Luckily, nobody was injured, and my friend apologised to me for the damage to my house. It was a really stupid thing for him to do, someone could have been really hurt, and I was really, really angry with him about it" (those quotes were condensed to "I was really, really angry" in The Sun).

And the stories just kept on coming. Following the derby win rumours circulated on social networking sites, talkboards and even Sky Sports News that Mario was driving around Manchester in a convertible high-fiving City fans. The fact that not a single mobile phone image has emerged to verify this means we can conclude that this too only happened in someone's imagination. The following day came a story claiming that, after being sent out to buy an ironing board, he instead returned with a giant trampoline, scalextric, two vespas and a table tennis set (the story was later refuted by Mario's girlfriend Raffaella Fico).

And do you wanna take a wild stab in the dark about where that story first appeared? Yep, you guessed it - The Sun's Bizarre column, who used that most cast-iron of sources to stand the story up, an anonymous Tweet.

So what exactly are we left with? Most likely a fun-loving prankster who, like most young men nowadays, is a little too immature. Actually, forget the nowadays. At his age I was still walking over parked cars on the way back from the pub, so I can hardly talk. And considering how much spare time footballers have, how rich they've become and how restricted they are in their off-field activities, I'm constantly amazed that young single players aren't doing more mad-cap stuff. In fact, I'm starting to think that the main reason that footballers raise families at a much younger age than average is that it gives them something to do aside from playing video games.

Of course, there is another side to Mario. The young man with a somewhat difficult upbringing, who comes across as thoughtful in this Vanity Fair interview and again in this official interview. Then there's his charitable work on behalf of child soldiers. But again, let's not be swayed too much by the positive press either. In fact, I'd agree with the comments of Mike, on CityMancs:

"These articles are commonplace and if you search you can find one similar for every player out there.  Loads of charity work, a gentle soul really who nobody understands, etc. I have trouble seeing them as anything other than propaganda. Furthermore, I couldn´t care less if he is a loose canon and a miserable, selfish twot who never does anything for anybody else. He´s paid to play football and if he does so well for my team, anything on top of that, good and genuine as it may be, or otherwise, is his business. This fashion of demanding that footballers have a duty to do good elsewhere just breeds hypocrisy and all too many just ´play the game´ and pay lip service to one cause or other on the advice of their entourage to make them look good (or at least not bad). 

At the end of the day though, all I really care about is that he helps City win something."

                                     
So why always you, Mario?

Because media companies need to sell newspapers and attract viewers and listeners. Because you're prodigiously talented. Because you're playing for the most talked-about club in the country. Because you're a show-off and a prankster. Because it has to be someone.

And it sure as hell ain't going to be James Milner.

Coming up on Purely Man City

I'm aiming to run at least one main feature a week from now on. I'll also be running a "Best of the Boards" feature each Friday, bringing you the best comments posted on City's talkboards that week.