Belanov: “I would have played in Napoli. I told Maradona not to touch the Golden Ball”
The Ukrainian legend on the Sports Sheet: “Football saved me, I lost my father when I was eight”.
Igor Belanov, Ukrainian football legend, made some statements to the microphones of Il Foglio Sportivo. In 1986 he won the Cup Winners’ Cup with Dinamo Kyiv, then scored four goals at the Casabella World Cup, that of Maradona and his hand of god. One fine season they gave him the Golden Ball. Here are his words: “Football saved me, I lost my father when I was eight, my mother at first made me enter a kind of orphanage, if she had let me free, I became a delinquent.”
Belanov then added: “I think if I had had a choice I would have played in the Naples. Anyway in Spain or Italy. Places full of sun and people smiling. We Ukrainians from the south are like that ”.
He won the Ballon d’Or in place of Maradona because, at the time, the trophy was reserved exclusively for European players, a rule changed in 1995: «I met Maradona in 1986. We joked about that Golden Ball that he was fascinated by. He told him not to touch it. He had won the World Cup and the trophy for best player in Mexico. What more do you want? I asked him. I told him that he had to be satisfied. I have never considered that Golden Ball as a personal success. Perhaps if Maradona had won it, it would have belonged only to him. But in my case it was really a team success. That Dinamo Kyiv was a collective experience, that prize could be awarded to any of the owners. We had formidable defenders, without whom I would not have been able to play with such freedom. There were Kutzenzov or Demyanenko, very strong, but we know that certain prizes go more easily to those who score. Forward were also Zavarov and Blockhin. We were full of talent. I was just luckier than the others ».
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