Since leaving Liverpool, Mario Balotelli has played for seven different teams; his most recent move saw him return to the Turkish team Adana Demirspor.
Given his tremendous breakout, Balotelli’s career trajectory will go down as one of the oddest in modern football.
While at Inter Milan, he was regarded as one of the best young players in the world, but since then, he has struggled with attitude and application concerns, leading to a brief unsuccessful stint with Liverpool.
He only stayed on Merseyside for a single season before being loaned back to AC Milan in 2015, whereupon he later signed a permanent contract to join OGC Nice.
After that, players transferred to FC Sion, Marseille, Brescia, Monza, Adana Demirspor, and other clubs. The last move from Turkey to Switzerland happened as a result of an altercation with manager Vincenzo Montella on the field.
Balotelli was sold to Sion four days after Montella became enraged, with the manager and his striker being kept apart only by personnel.
But now that it has been about 13 months after Montella left Adana at the conclusion of the previous campaign, the 33-year-old has returned.
The Italian had been instructed to practice apart from the first squad at Sion and there had been rumors of a transfer to the Saudi Pro League.
On September 14, Sion officially cancelled Balotelli’s contract, and the following day, Adana officially accepted Balotelli’s free transfer.
With 19 goals and seven assists in 35 games during his first season with Adana, Balotelli had one of his best single-club seasons.
While at Liverpool, he made 28 appearances, 14 of which were as a starter, but only managed to score four goals, play the full ninety minutes six times, and go without recording an assist.
In a 2016 interview, Balotelli called his £16 million switch from Milan to Liverpool “the worst mistake of my life.”
