COS MY TEAM-MATES ‘HAD BET ON A DRAW’

FORMER footballer Stiliyan Petrov fell out with his teammates because he scored the winner in a match which had allegedly been fixed to be a draw.

The ex-aston Villa and Celtic star was just 16 when he came on as a sub to make his debut and netted late on to give Bulgarian club PFC Montana a 3-2 victory.

But as he celebrated none of the squad joined in and gave the teen the cold shoulder afterwards.

Disaster

The 41-year-old later discovered players had allegedly taken cash to fix the game at 2-2 so their opponents PFC Litex Lovech – who needed a draw – would not get relegated from the top division.

He said: “I scored on my debut in the league.

“The game was apparently fixed between Montana and the other team to finish 2-2. I didn’t know that. I scored and Litex Lovech went down. It was a disaster.

“I couldn’t get into the dressing room after. It was very difficult full afterwards. All the experienced players were not happy.

“The other team needed a point to stay up and the players decided they would give them the point but I didn’t know that. Of course I celebrated when I scored. But no-one came over to me, no-one said a word and there wasn’t even time to score back afterwards.”

The man known as “Stan” also said that as a teenager he would regularly stay up until 6.30am drinking before going training.

And he revealed that when he then signed for CSKA Sofia all the money was paid in cash and his dad brought home two massive bags of notes.

He added: “It was a difficult time growing up in Bulgaria at that time. There were some bad people.”

In 1999, aged 20, he signed for Celtic before moving to Aston Villa for £6.5million in 2006. He is Bulgaria’s most capped player with 105 appearances and won a wellpublicised fight with leukaemia.