Player fakes his own kidnapping to avoid training | OneFootball

Even if you are being paid thousands to kick a ball around, training must be the least enjoyable aspect of being a professional footballer.

All that jogging, dribbling through cones and lifting weights in the gym every day must get pretty tedious after a while, and one footballer was prepared to go to extreme lengths to get out of doing it.

Paulo Silva, also known as Somália, is a 34-year-old journeyman midfielder who has spent the bulk of his career playing in the Brazilian second tier and is currently without a club.

In 2010, Somália rocked up at Botafogo and according to Portuguese outlet A Bola, it was during his debut season at the club that he decided to skip training one day.

But rather than pretending he was unwell or admitting he simply couldn’t be bothered, the then 26-year-old concocted an elaborate story in which he claimed he couldn’t make it to training because he had been assaulted and kidnapped.

Mate, seriously? You could have just dangled your head over the side of your bed to make it sound like you had a cold when you called in sick. Apparently that works, but of course we’ve never tried it.

Unfortunately for Somália, it didn’t take the police long to check surveillance footage and work out he was bullshitting them.

In reality, he’d been out partying until five o’ clock in the morning and when he eventually did stagger home, he hid all his jewelery in his garage to make it look like he’d been robbed.

Botafogo found out what happened and Somália was fined before being shipped off on loan. He eventually left the club in 2013 having made just 34 appearances.

So remember kids, it’s always better to be honest but if you can’t be honest, at least make your lies sound believable.