“Unfortunately we have decided to declare Sadio out for the World Cup,” proclaimed the team’s doctor, Manuel Afonso, quoted on the Twitter account of the Senegalese Football Federation (FSF).
The bad news came late in the afternoon, a few hours after the “Lions” training session at their Lusail facility in Doha.
“Unfortunately, today’s MRI (Thursday) shows us that the evolution is not favorable as we thought,” said the doctor, adding that “a surgical intervention must be scheduled very soon” to operate on the player.
Sadio Mané was being treated in Munich by doctors at his club, Bayern, and had not joined his teammates in Qatar, where Senegal makes its debut against the Netherlands on Monday.
“Los Leones de la Teranga” will do so without their leader, who led them to their first victory in the African Cup last February, and finished second in the Ballon d’Or after a magnificent season.
Since his injury on November 8 with his club, Bayern, during the victory against Werder Bremen (6-1), in an action with defender Amos Pieper, no means have been spared to recover the Senegalese figure.
Afonso went to Munich on November 10 and 11 to examine the player and consult the MRI images again. This Thursday it was decided to proceed to new studies.
After his injury, Sadio Mané and his entourage had initially given up all hope of being in the World Cup, before becoming somewhat more optimistic.
And, after the visit of the team doctor, it was decided to include him in the list of 26 players called up for the World Cup.
The coach Aliou Cissé will now have to find a replacement for him, he has until Sunday to do so, the eve of Senegal’s great debut.
Mané’s former teammate at Liverpool, Virgil van Dijk reacted to the announcement of his withdrawal by tweeting that he would have “lovely played against him” in that Senegal-Netherlands game.
The Senegalese, he wrote, “have players to replace him, but not of the same quality. He is really a player out of the ordinary, I will miss him.”
“Mané is irreplaceable,” explained the Senegalese Pape Gueye in an interview with AFP before the discharge was made official. “But we have very good forwards.” A halo of hope in a dark day for Senegal.
Source: Ambito
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