Ozil feud: ex-girlfriend blamed for legal dispute with father

Arsenal record signing Mesut Ozil has endured a turbulent few months since winning the World Cup with Germany, and now the full extent of the turmoil in his personal life has been made clear.

After being singled out by angry Gunners fans for some lacklustre performances, Ozil was sidelined until the new year with a knee injury. He also split from his girlfriend Mandy Capristo after claims he was having an affair, and now it has emerged he has been involved in a long-running legal dispute with his father amid accusations that Capristo had driven a wedge between them.

The legal dispute erupted after Ozil's father, Mustafa, who used to be the player’s agent, claimed he was owed almost half-a-million pounds after losing his job at a marketing company owned by his son, explains the Daily Telegraph. Ozil responded by demanding the return of an £800,000 loan and a company car, and the case was due to be heard at Dusseldorf state court this month.

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Court papers released this week confirmed that an out-of-court settlement was reached last month.

It was Mustafa who brokered Ozil's move to Arsenal in 2013 but relations between father and son have soured dramatically since then. German paper Express says the cracks began to appear after Mustafa and Ozil's mother, Gulizar, broke up, something that came as "a great shock" to Ozil and his three siblings.

Ozil's brother Mutlu now looks after the player's affairs, while Mustafa has blamed Ozil's ex, Capristo, for their falling out.

In an interview with Express, Mustafa claimed it was Capristo who had "come between father and son". He added: "She made him crazy. And he was head over heels."

She is no longer around, after what was described as a "far from amicable" split following claims Ozil had an affair with the ex-girlfriend of another player. However, the German midfielder refused to drag his ex-girlfriend into the row. "Mandy is not to blame for the break with my father," he told another German newspaper, Bild.

Arsenal fans may be surprised by the extent of Ozil's personal problems, but the German national team are not.

"The fact that there were problems between Mesut and his father is not news to us. But Mesut puts private issues to one side and does not talk to us about it," revealed Germany's general manager Oliver Bierhoff.

There was one piece of good news for Ozil this week. Last night he was presented with a Laureus Sport for Good award in Berlin for his decision to use his World Cup winning bonus to fund 23 operations for seriously ill Brazilian children.