While appeared alongside former Man United teammate Rio Ferdinand on his self-titled podcast, Berbatov revealed he was kidnapped as an 18-year-old while with CSKA Sofia.
After getting into a fellow player’s car, he was driven to speak with the boss of a rival club.
"I was really showing what I can do on the pitch, really starting to show my qualities,” he said.
“Normally, when you show your quality as a player, teams will come for you, submit offers, ask how long you have as a contract, how much do you cost to buy, and stuff like that.
“Back home was more different. Back home was like, 'Him? All right, bring him here.
"After training, I didn't have a car. So a team-mate of mine, he was like, 'Come with me, I need to bring you to a friend of mine.' I was a bit naive, of course.
“Maybe I trusted him because we played in the same team. So I got into his car. He drove me to a restaurant. We got into the restaurant, and in the restaurant there were obviously tables.
“On one table, there was a guy by himself. On three other tables, there were big guys - refrigerators - typical Balkan guys sitting behind him, just looking and watching you scarily."
The 44-year-old then recalled being scared for his life, adding: "The guy who brought me there was like, 'Go over there, sit, I'll see you later.'
"The (other) guy was like, 'Come here, sit down.' I'm sitting down, and it's like, thinking to myself in my mind, 'What is going on? I need to call my dad.' The guy started talking, 'Do you know what they call me? They call me the cook'.
"'We know about you. We need to change the team. We want you in our team. We need to get you.' I'm like, 'Yeah, but I'm playing in CSKA Sofia.
“I mean, I like it there.' 'We will figure that out. Don't worry about it.' The guys were sitting there and I'm just intimidated and thinking, 'I need to call my dad.'
“So maybe two, three hours sitting there, and in the end, the guy let me call my dad, saying 'I'm here. I don't know where I am. The people around me, big guys.'"