Kenny Jackett refutes Mario Balotelli clash

Wolves boss Kenny Jackett today completely played down the alleged 'clash' between Liverpool's Mario Balotelli and George Saville.

Social media went into meltdown after it was reported on Twitter that the Reds' £16m new signing had been involved in a clash with Saville, during the friendly at Liverpool's Melwood training ground on Friday.

The alleged incident was reported after a picture appeared on the networking site, which showed Balotelli surrounded by three or four team-mates and Saville apparently holding his head.

But head coach Jackett, who watched the game which ended 1-0 to the Reds, said nothing happened.

"I can't even remember a 50-50 between Balotelli and Saville," said Jackett.

"Declan Weeks pinged the ball off him a few times but then Balotelli showed some fantastic pieces of skill to go past some of our lads as well.

"I can't really think of an incident where him and Saville clashed, if I'm being truthful. Balotelli was substituted, but not after any particular tackle or incident.

"The guys seemed to be warming up for ages and they seemed to be saying (to Balotelli) 'give him another 10 minutes'.

"It looked like he was always going to come off after an hour, but he went on until maybe 70 minutes. It was Colin Pascoe (Liverpool assistant manager) shouting to the player, who was happy to stay on.

"There were a few tackles but no incidents or anything that the referee couldn't handle or didn't pass on quickly.

"There was nothing we, or Brendan Rodgers or Colin Pascoe were unhappy with or that the referee made anything of."

The picture appeared in the national media and it seems it was taken from behind fencing at Melwood.

"It was an unusual situation because there's heavy fencing all around their training ground and you can see someone appear from time to time – they must be up on a ladder or something," said Jackett.

"But football is big news and it's really popular and they have just signed Mario Balotelli, so you can see people are naturally inquisitive and they see over the fence.

"It was good for both sides because they had a strong team out as well with Jose Enrique, Kolo Toure, Lucas, Suso, Adam Lallana, Fabio Borini and Balotelli played.

"They had seven recognised players and it was an enthusiastic game of good football."

Jackett added: "There were a few tackles in the game but nothing out of order. You see a lot of those games and they are very slow and deliberate, but this one had a good tempo to it and was quite competitive.

"Both sides wanted to attack."

Jackett was delighted with the workout as new signings Saville and Tommy Rowe got their first 90 minutes since joining the club.

"I enjoyed watching it and we held our own – we gave as good as we got," he said. "Our side played well – we played constructive football and we had good enthusiasm.

"It was a good standard of game overall and our lads did themselves no harm at all. There were no incidents."