'Sadio Mane's salary bothered the Germans,' says PR manager on Bayern Munich exit

Mane has joined Saudi club Al Nassr

According to astonishing claims made by Sadio Mane’s PR manager, Bayern Munich‘s refusal to comprehend how an African superstar might have been their highest-paid player was the real reason why the striker left the team.

On Tuesday, Sadio Mane’s £34 million transfer to Al-Nassr in Saudi Arabia was officially announced, ending his miserable tenure at Bayern.

The 31-year-old is playing for Cristiano Ronaldo‘s team in the Saudi Pro League, earning an astounding £34 million annually (£650,000 weekly). Al-Nassr has previously signed players like Seko Fofana, Marcelo Brozovic, and Alex Telles this summer.

Sadio Mane only transferred to Bayern Munich last year for £35 million, but he failed to adapt to life in Germany, managed just 12 goals for the squad, and also had a public falling-out with colleague Leroy Sane.

Mane reportedly received a salary of about €20 million (£17.3 million) when he transferred from Liverpool, making him one of the club’s highest earners.

Sadio Mane received harsh criticism for both his exorbitant salaries and his underwhelming performance, but his PR manager, Bacary Cisse, defended the club’s way of handling him and maintained that other important causes contributed to his departure.

‘It wasn’t a footballing decision (to sell him),’ he told After Foot RMC. ‘Sadio’s salary bothered the Germans; they didn’t understand how an African joins the club and becomes the top earner ahead of everyone, so they wanted to get rid of him.

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‘They never called the player’s representatives. They never told Sadio face-to-face that they wanted to get rid of him. They just sent (Thomas) Tuchel to tell him that he will be a third-choice left winger.  

‘Sadio has nothing to prove to the Germans. He didn’t become what he’s become thanks to Bayern. It was thanks to Liverpool. Bayern were ungrateful. They were paying an African all this money, and that hurt them.’

Cisse continued: ‘He was professional until the end. But the people in charge at Bayern weren’t fair.

‘They first leaked to the media that they were ready to sell him for €20 million (£17.3 million). But after he returned to training and they saw he was doing well, they raised the price to €30 million (£25.9 million).

‘Sadio didn’t steal his money. From the first meeting with Bayern, he gave them his word that he would join without talking about the salary. His representatives negotiated that salary for him.’

With five goals around the end of August and an additional six by the time the Bundesliga was suspended for the World Cup in Qatar, the attacker appeared to have had a great start to his time with the team.

But after the injury, Sadio Mane lost his form and fell down the pecking order at Bayern, where he became a liability and was among the players looking to be sold.

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