Sadio Mané, a Liverpool winger, is one of the most devastating strikers on the pitch today, making him a significant draw for football fans watching the Africa Cup of Nations (CAN), where he will serve as Senegal’s playmaker. 
Génération Foot, a Senegalese club that has played a key role in Mané’s spectacular rise, was instrumental in transforming the national team into an African football powerhouse.
Sadio Mané became the first Senegalese player to win the Premier League in Liverpool’s incredible 2019-20 title victory, as well as the first Senegalese player to score in a Champions League final the year before and the first to score more than 100 Premier League goals. Can he be the first Senegalese player to lift the CAN trophy?
As Senegal begins their CAN campaign against Zimbabwe on January 10, trying to achieve their long-standing potential, as most famously demonstrated in their victory over France in the 2002 World Cup, FRANCE 24 looks back at the brilliant career of their captain and star Mane.
Mané, 29, grew up in rural southern Senegal and had an early interest in football. However, his father, a local imam, stopped him from playing. The young Mané fled to the city, Dakar, to try his luck – an unsuccessful attempt that concluded with a bargain between him and his mother: he could play football as long as he maintained his education and remained a good Muslim.
At the age of 15, the aspiring footballer left home again, this time with his family’s permission. A talent scout discovered him playing in a small football competition in M’Bour, 80 km southwest of the capital, and arranged for Mané to take tests in the capital. 
“We were organising tests in Dakar, and my colleague in M’Bour had brought back his four best players, one of whom was Sadio Mané,” Jules Boucher, then a recruiter for Senegalese club Génération Foot, told FRANCE 24. “I formed two teams for a match and assigned Mané the number ten position; after fifteen minutes, he made the strongest impression on me. I ended the game. I told my colleague, “If this kid gets good training, he will become a great player.” 
All of the attributes that football fans like in Mané now were evident even then, particularly his proficiency with intricate skills, lacerating pace, and incisive passing. Boucher thought that Mané’s abilities would be best utilised by positioning him on the left wing of the attack, a position he now holds at Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool.
Génération Foot has played an important role in developing new Senegalese talent over the years. Mady Touré founded it in 2000 after a football career ended due to injuries. Touré’s first major achievement was the development of Togolese striker Emmanuel Adebayor, who moved to Ligue 1’s Metz in 2001 for two years before joining Monaco and then capturing the attention of football fans around the world with spells at Arsenal, Manchester City, and Tottenham. Génération Foot’s connections to Metz proved to be instrumental in creating this pipeline of Senegalese talent.
After FIFA implemented a policy preventing the movement of minors, Metz chose to “invest in infrastructure” and establish a “real training centre to keep players until they reach 18,” according to the club’s president, Bernard Serin.
Indeed, Metz built a massive building to serve as a training institution, complete with new fields and even a boarding school.
Meanwhile, Génération Foot was fast rising up the levels of Senegalese football after a slow start in the third division, thanks in large part to its young talent. During his brief tenure, the young Mané helped Génération Foot win promotion to the second level. The club’s rise continued without him; it now competes in Senegal’s first division, where it has won twice.
Mané immediately made an impression when he joined Metz in 2011.
“His potential became clear to us from the moment he arrived; I remember it perfectly – it was a match against Bastia in January, the way he cut through the defence and got a penalty,” Serin said. “It was incredible for someone just starting out in European professional football; all of the skills were present. He only played for us for around a dozen matches, but that was enough to get him called up for Senegal.”
Mané could have transformed Metz into a French football powerhouse. But, unfortunately, the club was relegated for the first time in its existence that season. To stay afloat in their fragile financial situation, they had to sell some of their best talent. The same year, they also sold Kalidou Koulibaly, who is now a well-known Napoli centre-back and, alongside Mané, the linchpin of Senegal’s national team.
“It is a source of regret that we had to let them both go so soon; they could have really made the fans happy for a few years if we’d been able to keep them,” Serin said in a statement.
On the final day of the transfer window, Austrian side RB Salzburg signed Mané for €4 million. The winger continued his extraordinary rise there, soon establishing himself as a formidable force, scoring 45 goals in 87 appearances, including three hat tricks. Mané concluded the 2013-14 season as the club’s top scorer, with 15 goals across all competitions.
Mané captured the attention of football fans all around the world when he signed for Southampton in England’s Premier League, the most demanding league in the world, in 2014. The South Coast club had established itself as an increasingly powerful force in English football, a wellspring of talent to be snatched up by elite clubs at high rates.
As Mané grew in prominence in the Premier League, as seen by his 21 goals in 67 appearances for Southampton, Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp took notice.
Determined to restore this storied club’s dominance in English football, Klopp spent €36 million on Mané during the 2016 summer transfer window. Liverpool quickly began to collect medals, winning the Champions League in 2019 and the long-coveted Premier League title the following year.
