James Milner has given an interview to FourFourTwo magazine, in which he discussed his former team-mate Mario Balotelli!
The pair played together at Manchester City, and were officially team-mates at Liverpool in 2015 and 2016, although by that time the Italian had been frozen out of consideration by first Brendan Rodgers and then Jurgen Klopp – so wouldn’t have been involved in too much first-team training…
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In terms of character, Milner and Balotelli are a paradox! The former is an old-fashioned, no-nonsense Yorkshireman, while the latter is a brash, flash striker!
We have a soft-spot for both, but it doesn’t look like Milner had much time for Balotelli, who he politely described as an ‘interesting character’!
“I was there for the Darts incident,” he began. “At Carrington there was a leisure area upstairs with a dartboard and a window overlooking the gym, and as people were walking past the gym down below, he was firing darts at them! That’s up there with the most stupid things he did.
“The most stupid was probably upsetting Micah Richards in training. Micah wanted to rip his head off! Michah’s a pretty strong man, and if he loses it, you need to be somewhere else.
“He was striding towards Mario and and I dived in front of Micah to stop him and then hold him for long enough for a few other lads to jump in.”
Balotelli is pining for a move away from Nice, with Marseille interested in taking him.
Milner on the other hand is a starter at Liverpool and will hopefully pick up some silverware this season.