German championship: Sadio Mané suspended a match by Bayern Munich

Munich, Germany – Bayern striker Sadio Mané will be absent from the Munich squad for Saturday’s Bundesliga match against Hoffenheim, due to a heated argument with Leroy Sané on Tuesday after the game at Manchester City, the Bavarian club announced on Thursday in a statement.

The 31-year-old Senegalese is suspended by Bayern and fined after « misconduct after FC Bayern’s Champions League match at Manchester City », the club explained.

Mané will therefore be available to his coach Thomas Tuchel for the C1 quarter-final return against Manchester City on Wednesday at the Allianz Arena.

After the Munich defeat in Manchester against City (3-0) in the quarter-final first leg, the tone rose in the Munich locker room at the Etihad Stadium between Sané and Mané, the best African player of the year 2022 reproaching the German international how to address him on an action at the end of the match, according to the German press.

Mané, who entered the game in the 69th minute, then struck a blow to the face of Sané, who had a bloody lower lip.

Both players took part in Bayern training at Säbener Strasse on Thursday morning, with Thomas Tuchel taking Sadio Mané aside for seconds. Before the training session, Mané had been summoned by Bayern sporting director Hasan Salihamidzic and chairman of the management board Oliver Kahn to explain his action.

Return of “FC Hollywood” in 2023

This incident between Mané and Sané is one more episode at « FC Hollywood », Bayern’s nickname for the whims of its stars, in a fairly prolific 2022-23 season.

First there was Serge Gnabry’s little-appreciated escapade at Paris Fashion Week in late January, then in early February, the spectacular media outing of injured goalkeeper and captain Manuel Neuer against his managers, to whom he blamed the dismissal of goalkeeping coach Toni Tapalovic, close to Neuer.

And there was the dismissal to general surprise of coach Julian Nagelsmann, replaced by Thomas Tuchel a few days before a decisive month of April for the season.

A week before his dismissal, Nagelsmann had regretted the presence of a « mole » in his locker room after the publication of game plans in the press.

The episode between Mané and Sané also recalls other incidents of the same nature in the Bavarian locker room, Lothar Matthäus and Bixente Lizarazu exchanging slaps in 1999 in front of the cameras, while after the semi-final first leg of the Champions League 2012 against Real, Franck Ribéry was fined after an altercation with Arjen Robben at halftime.

Mané arrived in Bavaria in the summer of 2022 from Liverpool, for a transfer estimated at 32 million euros. He was injured from the beginning of November to the end of February, hit in the right fibula which forced him to give up the 2022 World Cup with Senegal.