Former Liverpool striker El-Hadji Diouf has told L'Equipe he warned Mario Balotelli his career at Anfield would not work out because of Steven Gerrard.
Balotelli, 26, left Anfield to join French club Nice on deadline day, bringing to an end a two-year stay on Merseyside in which he scored four goals and made only 28 appearances.
After scoring twice in a stunning debut for Nice in their 3-2 defeat of Marseille on Sunday, Balotelli called his £16 million transfer to the Reds "the worst mistake of my life."
Diouf said: "I told him not to go to Liverpool. It wasn't made for him, that things couldn't go well with Gerrard, who has never had his talent and then said negative things about him.
"Gerrard is a jealous man who doesn't like men of character. Mario is a good person that you should listen to. He's not a guy who's going to cause problems in the dressing room.
"There are a lot of things that have been made up about him. People tell tales about him, but they're often a load of rubbish."
Diouf said he had discussed problems Balotelli had experienced during his spell at Manchester City with him, adding: "He was young when he arrived in England, you mustn't forget that.
"When he had problems at City, when he wasn't playing, we talked. I told him that it [his form] would come back. Of course it was hard for him, because he's very sensitive. People perhaps don't understand that."
Balotelli's fine debut for Nice saw him score his first goals for almost a year, but coach Lucien Favre told reporters: "It's just one match -- he still has a lot of work to do, and he knows it.
"I liked the way he was able to keep the ball and to give his teammates time to push up the pitch."
