After taking so long to settle, Mamadou Sakho’s stock has fallen dramatically at Anfield and there appears no way back while Klopp is at the helm.
Exiled Liverpool defender Mamadou Sakho “no longer exists in the eyes of Jurgen Klopp”, according to L’Equipe.
Sakho featured prominently towards the latter stages of last season as he finally showed signs of cutting out the errors that had dogged him since his £18 million move from PSG in 2013, as reported by the BBC.
However, all his initial good work appears to have been completely undone after the Frenchman was sent home from the club’s pre-season training camp for disciplinary issues.
According to The Guardian, the former PSG captain was late for several team meetings before he and Klopp had a heated argument during the California leg of Liverpool’s summer tour before using his Snapchat account to hit out at the ‘lies’ spread about his conduct.
Consequently, Sakho has not featured for the first-team since and was surprisingly overlooked for Liverpool’s 2-0 EFL Cup win against Tottenham Hotspur while the likes of Trent Alexander-Arnold and Ovie Ejaria (below), who the powerful defender has spent most of the season playing alongside in the under-23s, were given the chance to start.
And, as reported by L’Equipe, the divisive 26-year-old has no chance of forcing his way back into Klopp’s consciousness, especially after Joel Matip (below) and Ragnar Klavan arrived from the Bundesliga to boost his defensive options and Joe Gomez continues to make progress from an ACL injury that has kept him out for around a year.
To Liverpool fans, the news will resonate with either positive or negative connotations, with the fans divided over his quality.
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