Mario Balotelli almost stormed off the pitch during Brescia’s Serie A clash with Verona on Sunday after he was subjected to racial abuse once more.
The Italy international, who has been the target of attacks throughout his career, was again singled out for abuse from the stands during the league encounter at Stadio Marcantonio Bentegodi.
The 29-year-old was persuaded not to leave the field by team-mates and opponents alike after booting the ball into the crowd.
The referee subsequently brought play to a halt before following protocol, with a statement being read out via the public address system in an attempt to quell the situation.
Balotelli later netted a consolation for Brescia as they went down 2-1 to leave themselves in the bottom three of the table, while Alessandro Matri was shown an injury-time red card.
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The often enigmatic star has struggled with a long campaign of racial abuse against him throughout much of his career, with chants during a 1-1 draw while playing for Inter against Juventus in 2009 one of the earlier examples.
Though the forward, whose career has been marked by on and off-field incidents, initially tried to brush such instances off, things came to a head at Euro 2012 when he was abused by supporters from Croatia and Spain.
US-based website Stormfront took additional aim at his religion, leading to a ban in Italy, while a game the following year for Milan was suspended due to the actions of Roma supporters.
He further suffered racial abuse while playing for Manchester City and Nice, while Corsican outfit Bastia were ordered to play three games behind closed doors after their supporters were found to have made monkey chants.
Earlier this year, Balotelli came out in defence of Juventus youngster Moise Kean after he too suffered racial abuse during a Serie A game against Cagliari back in April.
He fired further criticism at Leonardo Bonucci after the Italy defender appeared to suggest Kean had incited the issue against himself, writing on Instagram: “Tell Bonucci that he’s lucky I wasn’t there. Instead of defending you he does that? Wow, I am honestly shocked.”
