Former Super Eagles defender Taribo West has revealed that Italian mobsters were the reason he left AC Milan having made just four appearances for the club.
West began his career in the Nigerian Premier League before moving to Auxerre, where he won the Ligue 1 title in 1996 to earn a lucrative move to Inter Milan.
During his time at San Siro, West won the UEFA Cup and played alongside the likes of Ronaldo, Diego Simeone and Javier Zanetti, but soon fell out of favour under Marcello Lippi.
That sparked a controversial move to Inter’s rivals AC Milan, and it was there that West’s potential move to Liverpool came about – because of the Mafia.
“The Mafia would do anything in their powers to make sure I was done away with at Milan,” West told Score Nigeria.
“They cooked a vicious story in the press that I was injured in the desperate bid to send me out of Milan.
“The doctors were bribed to say I was injured, but it was a lie.
“They did that because they felt it was unthinkable for an African player to take the place of those three ageing defenders [Franco Baresi, Alessandro Costacurta and Paolo Maldini].
“Liverpool came with an offer, but at the end of the day I had to settle for Derby County.”
West moved to Derby on loan in 2000 and made 18 appearances at Pride Park before joining Kaiserslautern on a permanent deal.
He later featured for Partizan, Al-Arabi, Plymouth Argyle and Paykan before hanging up his boots in 2007.
