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Mario Balotelli is a popular figure on Instagram who regularly posts pictures and videos for his 8.5 million followers to see. He never fails to pull attention, the former Liverpool and Manchester City star did something wild that sent waves across the internet recently.
After scoring a brilliant overhead kick from a Florian Thauvin cross in the twelfth minute while representing Marseille during a recent Ligue 1 encounter against AS Saint-Etienne, he collected his phone from the cameraman, filmed his celebration with his teammates and uploaded it on his Instagram account. The 28-year-old then carried on playing.
AS Roma's legend Francesco Totti also celebrated in a similar fashion in 2015, when the striker took a selfie of himself after scoring against Lazio in the Serie A.
Mario Balotelli joined Marseille in the January transfer window on a free and is enjoying a good run of form under Rudi Garcia. The Italian has scored four goals in sixteen games and seems to be a clever acquisition by Marseille.
Following his goal, Marseille then doubled their lead against AS Saint-Etienne with a Florian Thauvin penalty and eased to a win at the Orange Velodrome. With that victory, Marseille leapfrogged AS Saint-Etienne to the fourth position and are five points adrift of Lyon who sit in the last and final Champions League spot.
Saint Etienne coach, Jean-Louis Gasset was full of praise for the attacker after the game. He was quoted saying:
Balotelli takes the pressure, he takes the limelight. He reminds me of (Zlatan) Ibrahimovic and he scored an Ibrahimovic goal.He has brought back the public, the confidence, and many of his teammates will raise their level of play.
The Italian forward didn't have the best of times with OGC Nice in the first half in the season but he seems to have put his drastic start behind him and is performing exceptionally right now. He will be hoping to impress the manager so that he could get a contract extension as his current contract runs out this summer.
Here is the video of his celebration.
