Jay Bothroyd puts good times with playboy Saadi Gaddafi, son of dead Libya tyrant Colonel Gaddafi, behind him - Telegraph The pair met when Bothroyd moved to Italian club Perugia in 2003. Saadi was obsessed with football and had decided to try and make it as a player. He employed Diego Maradona as a technical consultant and the disgraced Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson as his personal trainer but only ever managed one substitute appearance for the club. By all accounts Saadi lived a decadent lifestyle in Italy, earning his reputation as the black sheep of the family. There are allegations of drugs, prostitutes and ambiguous sexuality. He invested in Hollywood movies, owned lions and, according to Simon Jordan, tried to buy Crystal Palace in 2004. He returned to Libya when war broke out to become a commander of his fatherâs special forces but escaped before the rebels could capture him. Now he is languishing in a state guesthouse in Niamey, the capital of Niger, under house arrest and the subject of an Interpol 'red notice' warrant. "It is very strange for me," Bothroyd said. "People will say to me, 'how can you be friends with this guy?' But you can only judge people on how you see them. He was always nice to me. I never met his brothers or his dad, they must be completely different. "It has been weird. He paid for my honeymoon. He asked me what we were doing for it and I told him we hadnât decided yet. So he said heâd sort something out for me. He paid for us to go to LA for a week and then on to Hawaii. All first-class travel and top hotels. It was very generous. Thatâs the side I see of him. I donât see the other side. I donât know it. Thereâs always corruption where thereâs power, so you never know. "His country want him back to prosecute him but they want to kill him apparently. Itâs all politics and I donât really know about it. I just know that innocent people should never get hurt." For Gaddafi, his time in Perugia was a rich manâs indulgence; for Bothroyd it was the turning point in a career gone sour. He described himself as an "arrogant and immature" young player whose talent had carried him to the top with fairly leisurely effort. He was sold by Arsenal for throwing his shirt at the respected coach Don Howe, a petulant reaction to a substitution. Coventry spent £1 million on him before he had played a competitive game but he was a player content to let things drift. "When I came through Arsenalâs youth team there was no pressure, it was just fun and jokes, messing around, doing tricks in training, trying to chip the keeper. In Italy everything was really serious, regimental, and it helped me. "It was really hard at first. The first month I was there my phone bill was £5,000. I couldnât speak the language so I was always on the phone home. I thought Iâd made a massive mistake. After three or four months I met some Italians who spoke English and I started to socialise with them and I started enjoying life. I lived between Rome and Florence, both great cities. I would definitely go back." The glamour of life off the pitch was reflected on it. Bothroyd collected shirts throughout that 2003-04 season. He didnât do badly: Buffon, Davids, Kaka, Shevchenko and Baggio. "The best is Paolo Maldiniâs shirt. He was the best player I have played against. Milan retired that shirt when he stopped playing." He is now an evangelist for expatriation of technical English players, approving of his old friend Joe Cole's move to French football with Lille. "I spoke to him about coming here to QPR before he went to Lille. Iâve known him since I was about 12 years old. We used to play for Islington district together. He was a bit different then, all about juggling and flicking balls over peopleâs heads. He would run round the whole team and then square on the line for me to tap in." While the football was carefree, his life outside the game was not. "I went to Holloway Boys school which was a rough school. I grew up in Archway but a lot of my friends were from Tottenham. A lot of friends of mine are in prison. "I remember my first day at school. I was there, very smart with my tie, my blazer and my new shoes and there was a fight and this kid pulled out a rounders bat and started beating this other kid round the head. From primary school to that, I was shocked. I was lucky that my friends looked after me, realised I could be a success." That success has been deferred. It looked like being a career shaped by squandered talent. After Coventry and Perugia, Bothroyd had failed to find consistency at Blackburn, Charlton Wolves and, briefly, Stoke. In 2008 he moved to Cardiff and things started to change. He scored 45 goals in three seasons and, last November, was called up to the England squad, coming on as a substitute in the 2-1 defeat to France. He joined QPR in the summer on a free transfer, rejecting âfive or sixâ other offers, including one from Spain. A big part of his motivation is to be able to spend more time with his eight-year-old son, who lives in London. Having found the adapting to his new club tricky at first, he now wants to make himself âindispensableâ to QPR and try to add to that one cap. He is getting serious off the field too. No more partying with dodgy playboy billionaires. He plans to adopt a child after he has finished playing and is investing more time in his charitable work. In Cardiff he had done fund-raising work for Ty Hafan childrenâs hospice and he has recently been trying to help Alice Pyne, a 15-year-old terminally ill with cancer. "She has given me a whole different outlook on life. She always speaks very positively. I chat to her on the phone and on twitter. Iâm in the process of trying to organise for her and her family to come to the Manchester City game. Sheâs never been to a football match and she has a bucket list and sheâs trying to do things with the time she has left. So Iâm going to help in any way I can." iReader http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/co...-Libya-tyrant-Colonel-Gaddafi-behind-him.html
I really dont know what to think of this having read it before I came on here. It seems the mans got good intentions and is indeed a nice guy who's turned his life around when he could have gone with his mates who are now in jail. However to be so oblivious and almost ignorant to what this guy, Gaadafi's son, is and what he's done in his past seems very naive. Yeah you can only judge people by how they treat you but what's gone on in Libya you'd have thought this may prove an exception.
