Sadio Mane may have sacrificed Liverpool the opportunity to get Jeremy Doku for a fraction of the money agreed upon between Rennes and rival Manchester City.
Pep Guardiola’s team accepted a £55 million pound bid for the 21-year-old, according to Mail Sport.
Doku is one of Europe’s most promising young talents right now, having piqued the curiosity of several major teams including Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester City, West Ham United, and Liverpool.
He is an Anderlecht academy product who currently plays for Rennes in Ligue 1. He joined the French club in 2020 and scored six goals in 29 league appearances last season.
However, the agreement may come as a surprise to Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp, who reportedly had the opportunity to sign him for a hundredth of the fee that Man City is poised to pay for him when he was 15 years old.
The winger had been granted permission by his old club Anderlecht to go from Belgium to Merseyside to meet Klopp and many of the team’s players.
Sadio Mane was one of them. He recently left the club for Bayern Munich and has now moved on to pastures new, joining Cristiano Ronaldo at Al-Nassr in the Saudi Pro League.
If Doku had decided to join Liverpool, he would have taken over Mane’s wing position, but the Senegalese international may have pushed the Belgian international not to.
According to The Mirror, Klopp was dead keen on getting the winger to the club and was willing to pay Anderlecht £500,000 in compensation.
With several other Premier League clubs circling the young phenom, the German presented him to some of the club’s top players in an attempt to convince Doku that Liverpool was the right place for him.
‘My 16th birthday was approaching, which is the age at which you may sign a professional contract,’ Doku told Ouest-France.
‘A lot of teams came to meet me – Liverpool was the most serious, but Arsenal and Chelsea were also interested.
‘I traveled to Liverpool with my mother and father, and we were given a tour of the stadium, the training ground, and even the school that I would be attending. I was given a signed Salah shirt and had the opportunity to meet the players.
‘I was able to chat with Jurgen, Gerrard also, we watched at certain video moments, and he spoke about the development.
‘We encountered players like (Simon) Mignolet, who was Belgian, and [Georginio] Wijnaldum, who was Dutch.’
He then chatted with Mane, who, according to him, did not go out of his way to get him to join the Reds, instead hinting that he should continue his development with Anderlecht in the Belgian Pro League.
‘I talked a lot with Mane, but we didn’t really speak football. ‘We discussed everything,’ the Belgian went on.
‘He assured me I was young and had plenty of time…’ He wasn’t attempting to persuade me or tell me, “Come here, you will succeed.”
‘So I preferred to be cautious,’ he explained.
‘I knew what my path had to be. I knew what path I wanted to take and that I needed to stay at Anderlecht at that time.’
Interestingly, it appears to have worked out well for the young prodigy, who has already gained 14 caps for Belgium’s senior team and made his debut for Anderlecht at the age of 16.
Former Belgium manager Roberto Martinez has previously praised the winger, calling him a ‘great talent.’
He would later transfer from Anderlecht to Rennes in a deal worth roughly £22.5 million, and it appears he has no regrets about not joining the Premier League team when he was 15.
‘Whenever I’m asked if I regret not joining Liverpool,’ Doku continues, ‘I always answer no, because if Liverpool came to me at 15, if they like me, they’ll come back later, that’s guaranteed. It is up to me to do well.’
While he may have turned down a transfer to Liverpool, it appears he is now in position to join Manchester City, with Guardiola seeing him as a replacement for Riyad Mahrez.