September 29 – Happy Birthday to Milan’s Odd Couple

FOOTBALL’S full of unlikely bed-fellows. Take Niall Quinn and Roy Keane living the Premiership dream on Wearside or Avram Grant and coaching qualifications. But have you heard the one about the President of Italy and the Chernobyl survivor-turned best striker in Europe? That’s right, today sees Milan President Silvio Berlusconi share a birthday with his former star player and the man he once considered ‘his son’ Andrei Shevchenko.

For the first half of this decade the Silvio-Sheva axis was blossoming. Serie A titles, European Cups and Golden Boots were all the rage for the Rossoneri as Shevchenko became one of the most prolific strikers in Italian history.

If your only experience of Shevchenko is that of a lost soul, listlessly wandering around the Stamford Bridge penalty area, then think again. His seven-year spell at the San Siro saw him score 127 goals in 208 games against the often-miserly defences of Serie A. The boy who was born today in the Ukraine village of Dvirkivschyna in 1976 has come a long way since his family was caught in the effects of the Chernobyl disaster in 1986 and forced to move to the coast to avoid the fallout.

Berlusconi’s story couldn’t be more different. Today in 1936 he was born in Milan into an upper-middle class family and has seen it all in his 71 years. As the leader of the political party Forza Italia he has twice been Prime Minister of Italy, but can also boast of being an entrepreneur, media mogul and Italy’s richest man with an $11 billion fortune. Mafia links and recent money laundering allegations with, somewhat randomly, Tessa Jowell also add to the man’s mystique.

Shevchenko broke up their happy union in 2006 when joined his pal Roman Abramovich for a ‘new challenge’ (or a shed-load of cash as it’s otherwise known) at Chelsea. As Sheva failed to settle, rumours were abound that absence was indeed making the heart grow fonder, as him and Silvio eyed each other up like a pair of fluorescent adolescents at the disco. The Italian lost patience though, and accused Shevchenko of being under-the-thumb as he believed his American wife had forced the move upon him.

“A true Milanista and a real man would not have behaved like this,” he tub-thumped to the Gazzetto dello Sport. “At my home I’m in charge and decide what happens. Instead, when Shevchenko’s wife shouts, he runs under the bed like a lap-dog. His wife ordered him to London with their children, where the fog will do their lungs the world of good.”

You’ve got hate that London fog. It was a problem for Sherlock Holmes and perhaps Berlusconi has found out why Shevchenko has only bagged four goals in the capital and doesn’t appear to be able to run anymore. Here at OTFD we like to remember the good times though, so see Sheva’s highlights for Milan below and come back this way tomorrow for a television first.