“We’ve got the same team as last season, we’ve just replaced Jordan Henderson with N’Golo Kante.” Within Brentford the excitement around Mamadou Sangare was boiling over even before his ball-winning, ground-covering displays against Tottenham and Leeds.
A club-record £39m move to west London has finally given him the chance to reach the “elite ceiling” his former colleagues have tipped him for. They describe a player and person of “pure light”, “raw technical ability” and “youthful playfulness”.
Sangare did not begin as a box-to-box midfielder but a No 10 who only evolved into a deeper role thanks to an experiment from his manager at Hartberg, Markus Schopp. Growing up in Mali, he had been nicknamed La Gauche Magique – “the magic left-footer”. A big tackler with an equally big voice.
Life in Mali
At Hartberg, he is still remembered for three things: scoring the goal that kept them up, never being injured, and for diving into the front row and “singing enthusiastically through a megaphone” with the fans after an away win at Wolfsberg. “He spoke only a few words of German,” recalls Hartberg’s Roland Puchas. “However, he was keen to learn and enthusiastic – and was therefore a crowd favourite.”
Sangare was born in Bamako, on the edge of the River Nile, but his football was forged on the dust pitches at Yeelen Olympique, a youth academy in Mali founded by the former Tottenham and West Ham striker Frederic Kanoute. By the age of 16, he was already playing for his country’s U23s.
Sangare with Grazer AK (Photo: Supplied)On one occasion, Mali were attempting to reach Afcon, but were trailing Senegal 3-1 from the first leg of a qualifier. In his hotel room before the return, Sangare met an old friend, Alassane Souleymane.
“As soon as he saw me, he said: ‘Big brother: I can see the lack of confidence in your face after what happened’,” says Souleymane. “’But I swear to you, come to the stadium, and I’ll deliver a victory with a goal’. You can guess the rest: Mali won 3–0, and he contributed a goal and an assist.”
There are more youngsters in Mali than ever seeking to become footballers. “It’s both a stepping stone, and a passion,” says Souleymane. “Today football is everywhere, even in the streets.”
His four loan spells
Despite being picked up by Red Bull Salzburg as a teenager, Sangare never made a senior appearance and was sent on loan four times. At the age of 24, he has been on the books at eight different teams across Austria, Belgium, France and now England.
At Grazer, in Austria’s Bundesliga, he was “fundamentally still a kid himself,” says his former captain Marco Perchtold. “Wonderfully warm, full of infectious energy, and possessing a delightfully chaotic charm. He had this incredible natural connection with children. He always had a super cute connection with our pitch manager’s daughter, Ella, who was a toddler back then. She absolutely adored him. Whenever he was around, he would drop everything just to play and make her laugh.”
Sangare is Brentford’s club record signing (Photo: PA)Sporting director Dieter Elsnegg was conscious that his new signing was adapting to a new culture. Perchtold remembers how Elsnegg would stay late in the club’s office kitchen to cook for him. “Didi prepared his spaghetti bolognese for Mamadou time and time again to make sure he felt nourished, comfortable and truly at home.”
Within a year, he was comfortable living in Austria, spending time with Ousmane Diakite, his defensive midfield partner now at West Brom. The two Malians played PlayStation together and went out to restaurants.
His first red card
It also prepared him for life at Brentford. Hartberg are one of Austria’s great over-achievers. Everybody there is “close-knit and personal”, and in just nine years they have reached the play-offs three times.
Grazer were perennial underdogs too, starting the club from scratch in 2013 after going into insolvency. Somehow, they made it all the way back to the top flight, where they became a springboard for young players to develop and express themselves.
Puchas recalls Sangare’s first match at Hartberg, when he was sent off just a few minutes in for “a hard foul”. “He was suspended for two matches – that was a pivotal moment in his development in terms of his tackling. After that, nothing like that ever happened to him again.”
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The Journeyman: Rotherham United and a crucible of desperation Transfers: Newcastle did the best bit of business this summerBrentford have signed a midfielder much closer to the finished article, one “technically strong, with pace and vision, who goes into tackles aggressively”. In a summer when Sandro Tonali, Elliot Anderson and Enzo Fernandez all moved for upwards of £100m, he is emerging as one of the best-value deals of the window.
Keith Andrews admits his side had to fend off “a lot of clubs” to bring him in from Lens. He has been deployed in the middle alongside Matias Jensen, but at Grazer he was more of a “central playmaker” or classic No 10. “He handled that pressure brilliantly,” says Perchtold. “His ability to manipulate space in 1v1 situations — especially with his back turned to the goal — was outstanding.”
Even after reaching the promised land of the Premier League, Sangare still takes time to send messages to his old teammates – most of whom believe “the sky’s the limit”.
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