Fiorentina striker Mario Gomez has defended his lack of goals.
The German hadn't scored for 259 days before ending his drought in a 4-0 win over Cagliari on November 30.
"There's been talk of me going 259 days without a goal," Gomez explained to Kicker.
"But nobody considered that 200 of those days elapsed between injuries and pre-season. The news had become my goal drought, but the reasons for it didn't matter.
"As players we're very privileged, but we're treated as showmen, not as men. I've never been out for so long in my career.
"I even bought a ping-pong table to try and get some of the adrenaline from sports that I was missing so much, but I had to play sitting down because of the pain in my knee."
