THE controversy surrounding the age of former Nigerian defender, Taribo West, was further expanded on Saturday, following another shocking claim by his former coach at
Italian side, Inter Milan.
Mircea Lucescu, who was the coach when Taribo played at Inter, has said he is not entirely surprised at claims that the Olympic gold medalist lied about his age, claiming that Taribo was uncoordinated and used to fall over in training, and the other players used to laugh at him.
Partizan Belgrade had claimed they discovered Nigerian defender West was 12 years older than he said he was when signing for them. He was at Inter from 1997 to 1999, then moved to Milan where he managed only four appearances. “West was not an important player for me. He was so uncoordinated he’d fall over and we all laughed. I didn’t have a good rapport with West and I wouldn’t play him after he threw his jersey on the ground against Vicenza,” Lucescu said of the 1998-99 campaign.
“I did not consider him to be an important player. He then went to Milan, I can’t figure out why. You’d have to ask Milan why they signed him….
“When I read the story about his age I couldn’t believe it, as 12 years is a lot. How did they manage to not realise earlier?”
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