Mario Balotelli is no stranger to hogging headlines for non-football matters and on Sunday he was back at it again — albeit for a hilarious reason.
The Italian striker showed off a new goal celebration on Sunday as he took a selfie video with his Marseille teammates and posted it on social media during their 2-0 win over Saint-Etienne.
Balotelli his fourth goal in six Ligue 1 games since joining Marseille from Nice in January by hooking home Florian Thauvin’s 12th-minute corner with an excellent acrobatic volley.
“Balotelli takes the pressure, he takes the limelight. He reminds me of (Zlatan) Ibrahimovic and he scored an Ibrahimovic goal,” said Saint-Etienne coach Jean-Louis Gasset.
“He has brought back the public, the confidence, and many of his teammates will raise their level of play.”
As he celebrated his volley, Balotelli took a phone from the cameraman behind the goal before filming the video with his laughing teammates and posting it on his Instagram story.
The 28-year-old then carried on playing.
Mario Balotelli scored this beauty then posted a Iive celebration on Instagram pic.twitter.com/3Zw6vKx9c8
— Michael Oti Adjei (@OtiAdjei) March 3, 2019
And here’s the celebration, as seen on his Instagram page.
Mario Balotelli really celebrated his goal with this Instagram post right FROM THE FIELD. 😂😂😂@FinallyMario, we are not worthy. pic.twitter.com/zQSYxAQvNp
— FOX Soccer (@FOXSoccer) March 3, 2019
He was not the first player to produce a selfie-based celebration, after Roma great Francesco Totti took a picture of himself after scoring against Lazio in the capital-city derby in 2015.
Marseille doubled their advantage nine minutes later through a Thauvin penalty and closed out the win with ease.
Rudi Garcia’s men have now taken 13 points from their last five league matches to leapfrog Saint-Etienne into fourth, just five points adrift of Lyon in the race for the third and final Champions League spot.
—Scores bicycle kick
— B/R Football (@brfootball) March 3, 2019
—Whips out his phone
—Straight on his Instagram story
It could only be @FinallyMario 😂 pic.twitter.com/oby0TEDbhs
Just another day in Balotelli’s life.