A FORMER Premier League striker has been jailed for a year after failing to pay £70,000 to his beauty queen ex-wife.
Ex-Aston Villa striker Bosko Balaban, 45, failed to pay financial support to model Iva Radic, who was named Miss Croatia in 1995.
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Balaban was married to Radic for more than a decade before getting divorced in 2017 and the pair have three children together – two daughters and a son.
But the former Croatia international was given a conditional sentence of one year and four years of probation in 2021 as a result of overdue maintenance money.
After failing to stick to the adhered time frame, the 45-year-old was imprisoned for one year in January with four years suspended, Belgian outlet HLN reports.
The report says a court in Zagreb handed down the sentence and that there is ‘no escape’ from prison time, saying that he would still be jailed even if he paid the overdue money.
The former center-forward is best known for his four-year stint at Club Brugge, where he scored 58 goals in 118 appearances.
He did, however, have a brief time at Aston Villa, appearing only eight times in the 2001/02 season without scoring.
The following season, he was loaned to Dinamo Zagreb, the club from which Villa had purchased him only a year before.
Balaban was ridiculed as one of the biggest flop signings of the Premier League era after Villa forked out £5.8million for his services – quite a lofty fee for 2001.
He has since worked as an agent after hanging up his boots, representing players such as ex-Leicester star Andrej Kramaric.
Iva Radic has 113,000 Instagram followers and is frequently seen posting glamorous snaps.
The model has also showcased her work with fashion giants Paco Rabanne, H&M and Chanel.
In October, a former West Ham player who tried to help sell a £1.9million antique vase stolen during a heist at a Switzerland museum was jailed.
Kaine Wright, 26, was caught in an undercover police sting along with accomplices Leslie Nkhwa, 47, and David Lamming, 31.
The “rare pomegranate vase from the Yongle Period (1403-1425AD)” was stolen during a raid at the Musee des Arts d’Extreme-Orient in Geneva in June 2019.
The trio attempted to flog it for £1million but later dropped the price to £450,000 in cash.
It had been valued by experts for insurance purposes at £1.96million.
Wright and Lamming were today jailed for three years after they were convicted of conspiracy to convert criminal property.
Nkhwa, who pleaded guilty to the same charge, was handed a two-and-a-half year sentence.
Southwark Crown Court heard the plot unfolded on July 30, 2020, when a man called Mr Steel emailed the China Guardian auction house in Hong Kong asking for a valuation.
The seller, later identified as Lamming, included photos of the item, which were compared with the stolen vase.
Lamming also emailed the Art Loss Register based in Hatton Garden saying he was in touch with someone who had a vase that had been stolen from Switzerland.
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