Liverpool forward Sadio Mane is known for being a calm, cool, even-keeled kind of guy in public. To see him rage on the pitch, like he did today in the Reds’ 3-0 win over Liverpool, is extremely rare.
In other words, it takes a lot to set him off, and we saw him fuming while on his way to being subbed off at the Turf Moor, and apparently the anger was directed at teammate Mohamed Salah. Mane was seemingly upset at Salah’s decision not to send him a pass while he was in optimal scoring position.
Sadio Mane, a player that rarely displays emotion is ANGRY at his team mate, suspectedly Mo Salah pic.twitter.com/BBL6xhAuxR
— Sulaiman Folarin (@sulaiman4real) August 31, 2019
Teammates James Milner, Joe Gomez, Jordan Henderson and Roberto Firmino all tried to calm the Senegal international down.
You can see another angle of the incident, from a different vantage point in the video below, supplementing the video posted above:
#SadioMane Was Very Angry Because When #MSalah Refused To pass Sadio mane Please Watch Vedio You will see The Action pic.twitter.com/CG2YFLni7w
— Abas Ali?? (@AbasAli252) August 31, 2019
After the match, Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp did what managers are supposed to do and played down the altercation. He admitted the incident was rather out of character for Sadio Mane, but maintains his player didn’t do anything wrong.
“He was upset, that was obvious,” Klopp said. “Sadio cannot hide his emotions and I like that. It’s all sorted.”
“We spoke about it and everything is fine. We are individuals, we are emotional. It was a situation in the game he wasn’t happy about — that’s completely fine.”
“Would he do it in exactly the same manner again? Probably not, but it happens. Nothing happened, he didn’t say any wrong words.”
Klopp then made a couple of really astute and spot on observations about the media, their tendencies, and the news cycle of the upcoming international break.
Klopp reveals why Sadio Mane was so angry when substituted against Burnley! ??? pic.twitter.com/2tOBZxN4Vh
— Football Daily (@footballdaily) August 31, 2019
“Of course, I can understand that it’s a little story,” the German continued.
“Thank God we are now away for a week, so if you write something about it, we will not read it anyway. And after a week, nobody can remember anymore, so it’s a really cool moment to do it. But it is all good really, all fine.”
He is right of course- we’re now entering the slow news period of the internationals, and by the time the long period of doldrums are over, no one will be talking about this anymore.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, the author of “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry,” regularly appears on WGN CLTV and co-hosts the “Let’s Get Weird, Sports” podcast on SB Nation.
You can follow Banks, a former writer for NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune on Twitter here and his cat on Instagram at this link.