Liverpool have agreed to sell Sadio Mane to Bayern Munich for a deal worth up to £35m.
Bayern will pay an initial £27.5m with a further £5m based on appearance. The Bundesliga club will pay another £2.5m based on individual and team achievements.
The transfer fee means that Liverpool have sold the winger for more than the £33.5m (€39m/$40m) they paid to sign him from Southampton in 2016.
Mane has been core to the club’s success over the past six seasons so will depart with their blessing and gratitude.
Liverpool have been conscious of needing to evolve their squad without sentiment as a driving factor, and have efficiently recalibrated their attack with the recruitment of Diogo Jota, Luis Diaz and Nunez.
Bayern have been confident of landing the Senegal international having received a verbal commitment from him last month. They believed it enabled them to pull off a cut-price deal, especially considering the Nunez development.
The Bundesliga giants also pointed to their ‘soft’ negotiations with Liverpool for Thiago, selling the midfielder for an initial £20m with a potential £5m in add-ons.
New of Mane’s impending move came as the Senegal star took part in a parade around his country and returned to play football on a muddy surface in his home town Bambaly. The game saw former Senegalese internationals Papiss Cisse and El-Hadji Diouf also playing with a large crowd watching on.
Sky Sports pundit Jamie Carragher tweeted:
“My favourite @LFC player of this era, Sadio Mane finally departs low maintenance high performance & never injured! Trophies & goals galore, a true Liverpool Legend. Thank you Sadio.”
The 30-year-old informed Liverpool of his desire to leave after their Champions League final defeat against Real Madrid in May.
Mane is ready for a new challenge after six years at Anfield and hinted before the Champions League final that he would be making an announcement on his future.
Bayern were the immediate favourites to sign the attacker, as the German side are in need of further investment in their front line.
The Bundesliga winners are in danger of losing star striker Robert Lewandowski as the Poland international declared his desire to leave this summer, with Barcelona trying to sign him.
His arrival from Southampton in 2016 signalled the start of the glorious chapter that followed. Mane was, after all, Klopp’s first major signing. Fast, ferociously aggressive and ruthlessly efficient, he came to embody Klopp’s Liverpool perhaps better than anyone else.
Together with Salah, he helped redefine expectations of wide forwards, reaching double figures for goals in six consecutive seasons and scoring at least 20 in four of them. His overall total of 120 puts him 14th in Liverpool’s all-time scoring charts.
In fact, since 2016, only Cristiano Ronaldo, Karim Benzema and Robert Lewandowski have hit more goals in the knockout stages of the Champions League. It is another statistic which underlines Mane’s appetite for the very biggest occasions.
His contribution to Liverpool’s success under Klopp is even more impressive given the adaptions he has had to make along the way, switching from right to left to accommodate Salah in 2017, then switching to centre forward to make room for Luis Diaz last season.
Each role came with a different set of tactical requirements but Mane transitioned seamlessly every time, displaying a level of intelligence to match his physical and technical qualities.
“In each position, he is world class,” was Klopp’s verdict.
The numbers cement his Liverpool legacy while the consistency of his output, as well as the pivotal role he played in the club’s first title triumph in 30 years in 2020, ensures Premier League greatness too.
He won the Champions League, Premier League, FA Cup, Carabao Cup, UEFA Super Cup and Club World Cup in his time at the Reds.
Overall, he made 269 appearances for the club and scored 120 goals.