One of the biggest sporting stories that heralded the 2010 World Cup in South Africa was the injury to then-Germany captain Michael Ballack which ruled him out of what could have been his last tournament for the Mannschaft.
Michael Ballack’s injury became a global sporting news story due to a duplicity of factors. The first one was that the injury was going to mark the end of his career and the second which was more profound was that the injury was caused by a player who but for a late switch of allegiance would have been Ballack’s perfect replacement.
This injury happened on May 15, 2010, in the final match of the FA Cup between Chelsea which had Michael Ballack on their books, and Portsmouth which had Kevin-Prince Boateng as one of their key players.
During the game, the two German-born players had a series of confrontations including one where Ballack was deemed to have slapped Kevin-Prince Boateng but it was the tackle by Boateng which gained global focus due to the aforementioned reasons.
Thirteen years on, Kevin-Prince Boateng has divulged some major and unfortunate experiences he encountered as a result of the infamous tackle.
According to him, that incident represents another milestone in his career where his fortunes took a downward turn just when he thought he was going back up after declaring his allegiance to his father’s country – Ghana.
Kevin-Prince Boateng recounted a bizarre incident where a staff of the Berlin airport threw his passport away because of that infamous tackle.
He also remembers the death and rape threats his children and wife received because of his footballing action.
“I played good with Portsmouth and I was lucky that I had the World Cup. My last game for Portsmouth was the FA Cup final against Chelsea where we lost 1-0 and I tackled Michael Ballack which ended his career. In Germany, they literally killed me for it because it was the last game before the World Cup”, Kevin-Prince Boateng said on Rio Ferdinand’s Vibe with Five podcast.
“His management wrote that they wanted to sue me and I was on eight million front pages in the world being the bad boy. In Germany, they called me public enemy number one. It was crazy. I land in Berlin and a guy looks at my passport and he goes like, you are the guy. He then throws away my passport. That is how I was hated. They sent me letters home and threatened to kill my kids and rape my wife.
“A week before that I had announced that I was going to play for Ghana so all those things came together. I was called a traitor and even the racism thing came out” he said.
Kevin-Prince Boateng was however grateful that Ghana offered him the opportunity to play at the World Cup and had a great tournament.
According to him, the 2010 tournament which he admits to performing greatly, influenced the decision by AC Milan to buy him from Portsmouth who had just been condemned to the second-tier of English football.
“But I was lucky I had the World Cup. I performed really well at the World Cup and I had the opportunity to move to AC Milan, “ he said.
Kevin-Prince Boateng recently announced his retirement from football after a nomadic career that saw him play in Italy, Germany, Spain, and England.
For Ghana, Kevin-Prince Boateng made 15 appearances and scored two goals with the most fondly remembered one being the solo goal against the United States of America in the 2010 World Cup.
Source: www.ghanaweb.com