Doha: Senegal forward Sadio Mane has been ruled out of the World Cup in Qatar in a crushing blow to his team’s chances, officials said on Thursday.
Mane had been a doubt for the tournament after picking up a leg injury playing for his German club Bayern Munich last week, and it has now been confirmed he will not recover in time.
Senegal Football Federation officials announced that further scans had revealed he would require surgery.
Mane is the talisman of the Senegal side and a key player for them in attack. His absence will be a blow to their chances of advancing out of Group A, where they face the Netherlands on Monday before playing host nation Qatar and Ecuador.
Senegal initially said that Mane won't be available for the nation's opening World Cup matches.
It was widely believed and reported that Mane will miss the tournament altogether after he picked up an injury in Bayern Munich's penultimate match before the winter break.
However, the forward was included in the squad anyway in the hope that he would recover in time to play some part in Qatar.
That was expected to be the case if they get beyond the group stages, but it has now been confirmed that he won't be fit to play any of their matches in Qatar.
If all of the games go as expected, the team's final match against Ecuador could well be the one that determines whether they advance to the round of 16 or not.
While they do have other players in the squad that plays at a top level, Mane is undoubtedly their star man and their biggest threat going forward - without him, they're considerably weaker and his absence at the World Cup is a big blow for the African champions.
Source: AFP
