This is the charred remains of Mario Balotelli’s bathroom after dozens of fireworks were let off during an infamous 2011 party in his £3million rented mansion.
Pictures published by MailOnline for the first time today show how the indoor display started a fire that destroyed rooms in his £7,500-a-month house in Mottram St Andrew, Cheshire, causing a reported £400,000 of damage.
A friend of the millionaire footballer set off dozens of fireworks from ‘multi-shot barrage cannons’ in his first floor bathroom three years ago, starting a serious blaze.
Despite the fire he scored twice against rivals Manchester United on the day after the firework incident and Balotelli revealed a t-shirt with the cryptic message: ‘why always me?’
Carnage: This is Mario Balotelli’s wrecked bathroom in his £3million mansion after a friend destroyed it with a pre-bonfire night fireworks display
Chaos: This picture shows where the mansion’s bath was and tiles and plaster appear to have been blown off the wall and ceiling
Party: These are the ‘barrage cannons’ of fireworks set off in the bathroom, which wrecked the first floor and started a blaze on the eve a huge game again Manchester United. Balotelli scored twice and used this t-shirt to ask: Why always me?
Bathroom towels were set on fire and the flames spread but Balotelli has insisted that he did not cause the blaze and that the offending fireworks were let off by his friends.
New photographs appear to show how tiles and plaster were blown off the walls and ceilings, the walls were scorched and covered in soot and how the landlord had to rip out fittings and start again.
Balotelli’s four-bedroom house, where he no longer lives, suffered severe smoke damage and the bathroom was gutted in the fire, which needed ten firefighters with breathing apparatus to put it out.
The indoor display happened in the early hours on the eve of Manchester City’s top-of-the-table derby clash at Old Trafford in October 2011.
The controversial Italian and his friends escaped unhurt after fleeing the fire at 1am,
Bedroom: Smoke and soot damaged the walls, ceilings and fittings in the mansion in Cheshire’s stockbroker belt
Description: Balotelli said that he had put the fireworks in a bin in the bathroom, right and left, but left the room and one of his friends lit them
Danger: At the time it was reported that the Liverpool striker had been asked to pay £400,000 to the landlord for the damage caused
Trashed: These picture show the fire damage caused to the bathroom’s shower cubicle and the carpets and walls of neighbouring rooms
Liverpool’s eccentric striker had a rocket from his landlord, who wanted Balotelli, 24, demanded the Italian international pay for the estimated £400,000 repairs himself rather than go through insurance.
Describing what happened in an interview with Noel Gallagher on the BBC he said: ‘I was bored no, so I was with my friends and one of them was limping so I got one bin you know the bin? For put fireworks inside.
‘But nothing gonna happen right, so I left the room and I left the fireworks but I didn’t I walk out and then my friend go in the room and they just start screaming blah blah blah and the fireworks was going off and they put the fireworks on the bed, not on the bed sorry, on the toilet.
‘But just the curtain caught on fire, that’s it, nothing else. Just the toilet was lost’.
Balotelli has been the subject of controversy since being in English football, playing for Manchester City before being sold back to AC Milan. He returned to the Premier League this summer in a £16million move to Liverpool.
Having scored at Old Trafford, Balotelli unveiled a T-shirt which read ‘Why Always Me?’ in response to the scrutiny he finds himself under due to his tendency to prompt negative headlines.
Aftermath: The controversial Italian and his friends escaped unhurt after fleeing the fire at 1am three years ago
Response: Despite the unfortunate incident at home Mario was chosen to front a firework safety campaign days later
Fun house: Star striker Balotelli also built a racetrack in his back garden for this quad bike, seen after the fire in his garage. Famously his mother sent him to John Lewis for an ironing board and he came back with this and a trampoline
Hobbies: Balotelli also had scooters and a motorbike in the house, as well as a remote control car on the shelf
He was disciplined by the club for throwing darts at a youth team player in 2010, while he was also pictured trading punches on the training ground with former team-mate Jerome Boateng. He has paid a total of £300,000 in club fines.
In April 2011, it was reported Balotelli had spent £10,000 in parking fines and had his sports car impounded 27 times.
Liaison officials at the club were forced to reclaim the Maserati time and time again as the player was given an average of three parking tickets a day since joining the Premier League club.
He once crashed his sports car soon after arriving and it was reported that police found £5,000 in cash in his back pocket.
The striker was reprimanded for throwing darts at the training ground.
