Sadio Mane became only the 18th player in Liverpool's history to score a century of goals when he scored against Crystal Palace on Saturday (September 19).
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That Sadio Mane will go down in Liverpool history as an all-time great is, at this point, no big secret. A key member of Liverpool’s rise back to the top of English football, Mane is a player who guarantees both industry aplenty as well as a consistent end product.
The Senegalese winger has won both a Champions League and Premier League with the Reds, but on Saturday (September 19) joined another illustrious list. He became the 18th player to score 100 goals for Liverpool when he opened the scoring against Crystal Palace.
Indeed, given he has now scored in the last nine fixtures against Palace, you could say this was almost inevitable. “I love to play against Crystal Palace. It would be great to play them every single weekend,” Mane said afterwards. Whether Palace would enjoy that is a whole different story.
Mane also equalled Robin van Persie’s Premier League record of scoring against one side in nine consecutive fixtures. In the case of the Dutchman, the unfortunate victims were Stoke City.
Nevertheless, it is an excellent record for Mane to possess. And one that, ultimately, serves as a reminder of just how good the Senegal international is.
People tend to forget it now, but there were more than a few eyebrows raised when Liverpool splurged 34 million pounds to sign Mane from Southampton in 2016.
The following season saw him considerably upstaged by the arrival of Mohamed Salah. Indeed, many believe that Mane’s achievements would be noticed far more were it not for the Egyptian’s own goal-scoring exploits.
Yet that line of thinking ignores the fact that they are two very different players. Salah is more comfortable finding attacking positions to score, whereas Mane is a classic inverted winger. He is almost as prolific as Salah despite not getting similar the defensive freedom.
But to ignore Mane’s industrious nature would be to ignore a key part of what makes him so good. That he is as comfortable tracking opposition full-backs as he is when dribbling past them is a key part of his appeal.
It’s also why it makes his goal-scoring exploits look even better. A player with that kind of defensive work-rate should not be scoring as much as Mane has in his career.
Yet, in the 2017-18 Champions League final, it was Mane who scored Liverpool’s equaliser – joining Salah and Roberto Firmino in scoring 10 goals in a single edition of the tournament.
The following season saw him crowned the joint winner of the Premier League Golden Boot, with 22 goals. The players he shared the trophy with – Salah and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang – are more out-and-out goalscorers than him.
Yet there he was, sharing the same stage with them.
Sadio Mane maintained his form the following season as Liverpool ended a 30-year wait for a league win. But his output dropped noticeably in the 2020-21 season. He went from notching 20 or more goals in the past three seasons he played to scoring just 16 goals.
The decline in form clearly affected Mane, and while he cannot have been helped by contracting COVID-19 last year, he still was not happy with the way things were.
“I was so disappointed with last season, and passionately so, as I thought I could have done more,” he said.
“Whereas I might have been scoring between 18 and 22 goals a season, then on that occasion it was no longer the case so, of course, I was going to be disappointed.”
Is this a case of decline setting in or did Mane’s workload catch up to him? While it is not easy to answer that question, what is certain is that Mane suffered due to past comparisons to his own form.
A player as industrious as him requires his workload to be managed. That hasn’t exactly happened over the past few seasons at Liverpool. Barring his first season, where he was injured for a while, he’s played close to 50 games every season at the club.
That kind of output, especially given the high-intensity football Klopp demands, will catch up to any player eventually. And Mane has shown glimpses of being affected by that hangover thus far in the new season as well.
He’s scored three goals in five games thus far but continues to look some distance away from his best. That being said, notching up the type of record he has could well be the catalyst to a revival in form.
Liverpool fans will certainly be hoping for the same.
