Bulgaria’s national football team coach, Hristo Stoichkov, has alleged that several well-known Bulgarian  politicians bought lovely property in Sofia for much less than the plots were worth.  

“I made an investigation myself in which I found very interesting things,” Stoichkov said. “Two areas were bought for 90 000 euro. Mr Gerdjikov has taken about three decares and paid 45 euro a sq m. Dimitar Tsonev received 18 decares in Gorna Banya for his three decares in the Studentski Grad area in Sofia. Kamelia Kasabova paid 200 euro a metre while I paid 1000 euro for the same thing.”

Stoichkov made his comments as the main guest on the private Bulgarian-language television channel bTV on the morning of January 15.

Stoichkov said that he would resign from his position if Bulgaria fails to qualify for the Euro 2008 championship. Stoichkov told bTV that resigning would be the most natural thing to do.

“I believe we will qualify for Euro 2008 since the team is good and things are going as I’ve planned,” Stoichkov told Bulgarian National Radio.

Stoichkov rejected any possibility to step into politics. He said he has a lot of friends who are politicians, including the mayor of Sofia, Boiko Borisov, Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev, President Georgi Purvanov and Sliven mayor Yordan Lechkov.

According to Stoichkov, the door of the national team is always open to the former captain, Stilian Petrov, who left the team last year.

“I will never close the door of the national team,” the coach said. “It’s not so good that the agent of Berbatov is trying to spoil relations between Mitko and Martin Petrov or between me and Berbatov because of the rumours that I have manipulated the results for Best Player of the Year. How could I influence the decision of the journalists?”