nashark said:
Balotelli's not being singled out for one performance. The criticism is due to a series of the most lazy, individualistic performances ever seen in a City shirt - that to use the word performance seems a bit of an exaggeration.
It's incredible that he's scored 10 times (albeit against mediocre teams) and he still gets all this shit. How bad must he play - even when he is scoring goals - to get all this abuse? He gets to stroll around the pitch whilst many of us are being priced out of the club we love, to pay for mercenaries like him. That's why some people are getting very pissed off.
This does not even take into account his generally shameful behaviour: cheating; storming down the tunnel; diving; kicking other players; feigning illness and injury; refusing to applaud his own fans. This man is a stain at every football club he's ever been to, and will always bring so much disrepute to the shirt he's wearing that his own fans will take to abusing him. Balotelli is not the most hated man in football for no reason. He's a **** - pure and simple. I suspect most of own players hate him, too. And to demonstrate how poor he was last night, even Bobby Manc risked getting one of our best defensive players injured so that Balotelli could be hauled off the pitch when we needed a goal.
What separates Balotelli from most other players is that they look and play like they care about Manchester City. Whilst many people had poor games last night, most of them came off the pitch at least sweating.
I think, though, Balotelli was epitomised last season in one incident. After Inter had won of their biggest games in their history, at the end, instead of celebrating with his team-mates and being happy for the club, he slammed his shirt into the ground in disgust at not being played. Selfish, lazy, arrogant, and it's a myth that he has any discernible talent whatsoever. He's just an athlete with the intelligence of a 7 year old boy.
To say he has no discernable talent whatsoever undermines a great deal of the rest of your post imo as it shows you are (to some extent understandably) unable to form a balanced view on Balotelli due to your palpable hatred of him.
I was sat in the Liverpool end last night and I was genuinely embarrassed at some of his antics and his shameful workrate, but to my mind he has so many qualities as a player.
For me there are three fundamental qualities required in a striker:
Strength
Pace
Finishing ability
Most strikers have two of these: Owen had the latter two, Carroll has the first and the last (and does Tevez) and so on.
Balotelli has all three. His first touch is usually sublime (although not last night) and his passing is excellent.
Maybe it is the gambler in me, but I just don't want someone else to benefit from his talents before we've had our worth out of him.
I accept that outcome is diminishing as a possibility, but I don't think we've reached the point of no return either. I am certainly losing patience with him, but to say he has no discernable talent is the antithesis of what everyone who has worked with him at close quarters has said, including those that dislike him.