Tiago Mendes Definitely Didn’t Want to Play for Everton

This truly is the age of player power. Not just because players can demand high wages and pretty much force transfers whenever they feel like it, but because apparently players can now lock club presidents in the toilet and get away with it.

That’s what happened at Juventus recently. The club had set up a deal to loan Portuguese midfielder Tiago Mendes out to Everton for a year, but Thiago very much didn’t want to go. And so, as revenge for the club attempting to offload him, Thiago locked Juventus club president Giovanni Cobolli Gigli in the toilet.

“The story of me being locked in the toilet by Tiago is true,” Gigli told Sky Italia this week. “Alessandro Del Piero responded to the noise of me punching the door and offered to break it down. I told him it was better if someone else did it, as he needed to keep his shoulders in good shape for the Fiorentina game.”

(I guess that’s why Alessandro Del Piero is a club legend, and Tiago Mendes isn’t.)

I still don’t understand the physics of this. How do you lock someone inside a toilet from the outside? Answers on a postcard please. And is this a blow to Everton fans? To think that a player would take such drastic measures in response to nearly ending up at Goodison Park is pretty worrying, though Tiago’s problem was apparently more that Everton aren’t in the Champions League, which is where he wants to be.

Which makes it extra amazing that Juve didn’t end Tiago’s reign of toilet terror by selling him in the transfer window. And extra extra amazing that he’s been included in Juve’s Champions League squad. Giovanni Cobolli Gigli must be a very forgiving man.

Some Related Stories:

Category: Serie A