The Shortlist: Hamidou Makalou
The Shortlist: Hamidou Makalou
A midfielder of Klopp-spec qualities for your shortlists.
This is The Shortlist — the quick, digestible way to get to know football’s hottest property, as told by the scouts who’ve watched them.
Stephen Ganavas is the Analysis Editor at SCOUTED. He is also Australian and is, as I write this, destroying what was left of his sleep schedule to cover the U-17 EUROs. Some guy.
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Stephen. Conjure me a name worthy of The Shortlist.
Hamidou Makalou, a 17-year-old midfielder from Mali.
Quick links: Hamidou Makalou
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Introduce me to him. Why should people be excited?
Well, he’s going to turn 18 in July. And he’ll be a free agent this summer after he leaves the Guidars FC academy in Mali, when, as far as I’m aware, he’ll be touring Europe with a team-mate, Sékou Koné. The money at the moment is on both of them joining Red Bull Salzburg and continuing the Africa-to-Austria talent pipeline the club have so well defined.
But I wouldn’t be surprised if, after his electric showing at the U-17 World Cup last year, other clubs look to pounce. That was where he announced himself and made everyone sit up and pay attention.
He won SCOUTED’s Golden Ball at that tournament, see below - ed.
Paint me a picture. What’s it like to watch him play?
He’s just lots of fun. He can really engage in all aspects of play - you need a hard, between-the-lines runner off the ball who gets into good attacking positions and can score goals? He can do that. You need someone to sit a bit deeper and pick a pass? He can do that, too. You need a ball-winner in midfield who can cover huge spaces? He’s your guy.
The main issue for him at the moment is he’s a touch undersized. But within his age group category, you can just see him running on top of the ground compared to his peers. His ability to impact the game in so many ways just sets him above and beyond. And we saw that, again, at the Under-17 World Cup last winter.
+ Foundations of a power athlete
+ Exquisite technical fundamentals
- Not yet defined role
Can you make a contemporary comparison to a player people might be familiar with?
No.
We did this joke last week.
(A lot of expletives and ‘ums’ and ‘errs’ follow.) Maybe like a Fabio Miretti. Or, like — jeez, you’re really scraping my brain here. Maybe like a Federico Valverde.
Similar player: Federico Valverde
Great. What’s his career been like so far?
It’s impossible to say, really. Guidars don’t play top-flight senior football in Mali, so he hasn’t been exposed to the level of competition you’d be able to track and follow his progress. All we really have to judge him are his performances at the U-17 African Cup of Nations and the aforementioned World Cup.
He won the Silver Ball at that World Cup (and our Golden Ball, as mentioned - ed) so he’s clearly the cream of his age group. After those performances, he can probably pick whichever club in Europe he wants to move to, so that tells you where he’s at.
But in terms of being on the ground and watching his week-to-week, you’d have to ask someone in Mali. Maybe we’ll go if we get a few more subscribers, wink wink.
So a host of European clubs are competing for the signature of a kid who has only widely performed at youth international tournaments. Why? What are scouts seeing at that level that make them think ‘yeah, this kid could cut it at the big leagues in a few years?’
You’re looking at everything. There are some things in that level of football that might not translate as well to the top level, which I wrote a big piece on earlier this year (linked below - ed). Things like, having massive spaces to just waltz into, massive spaces behind defensive lines - those things aren’t available at senior level.
But in terms of technical fundamentals, general athleticism - his running power is immense - ball-striking, those kinds of things are noticeable. And especially motor skills. At that age you generally have a set technical ‘floor’, and there’s only so much you can add into your adulthood. Whereas you can see an athletic profile emerging that early, you’ll just need to think about how they might be able to build on it.
In Makalou’s case, he’ll need to grow a little bit because he is quite short, but you can see the building blocks of a power athlete in him already. His aggressiveness in challenges is obvious, for example.
There’s a huge number of variables when you’re looking at players in these tournaments so it’s hard to pinpoint one or two things in particular, but the more you watch them the more you get a sense of what may or may not translate to senior level. You can’t really put it into words, you can just tell. It’s a vibe.
Scouts have a sixth sense, confirmed. What’s the immediate future looking like? Say he does choose RB Salzburg after his tour - does he go straight into the first team?
That’s the thing with Salzburg - they never bring youngsters straight into the first team, especially when they come from Africa. Karim Konaté, for example, arrived with huge expectations but went straight to FC Liefering, Salzburg’s reserve side. He spent six months or so there and his time was spent acclimatising - it’s a big cultural shift in these young men’s lives - and adjusting to the standards of these huge academies with huge expectations.
So I would assume, if Makalou does move to Salzburg, he’d start at Liefering too. At least in the short term as he establishes himself, before he looks to push into the seniors. But as a rule, none of these players go straight into the first team. And I think that’s a good thing - six months isn’t a huge amount of time, and the dividends it pays in introducing these players to Europe has clearly worked for Salzburg and I think it’ll be something they persist with.
Say everything goes well from here on out. What’s his ceiling?
Well, when you see a player at the very peak of his age group, you immediately have to pin a ceiling at the Champions League. If he’s been crowned second-best at the U-17 World Cup - yes, not every nation’s there, but he’s clearly in the top dozen to eighteen players in his age group on the planet - you have to start from there and extrapolate out.
Obviously it’s a one tournament sample size, so maybe he just played out of his skin. But when you watch him, the full, rounded package that emerges will translate nicely and allow him to play different roles, different styles and see what fits as he develops; see where he specialises, see whether he becomes a complete, game-destroying stopper in midfield, or whether he settles into an off-ball runner, attack-the-box kind of player.
There’s a few different avenues you could see his skillset taking him. That’s why it’s a little difficult to make an accurate player comparison at this stage. He’s really good at everything now, but it’s really unusual for a player to move into senior football and remain so multifaceted. So when the pressures of senior football start, we’ll see which areas of his game hold up and that will define what kind of player he becomes. But you can see him playing a number of roles once it does, so you’d have to say Champions League is well within reach.
Sensible transfer: Red Bull Slazburg, obviously
Perfect transfer: Jürgen Klopp’s next club
Aaaand you’re in the glass box. I’ve locked you in because I’m evil. To escape, you must take the perfect, final form of Makalou and recommend him to a top club. Who’s it gunna be?
Wherever Jürgen Klopp goes. Makalou suits that style of football - that transitional, keep-the-game-moving, attack-spaces-as-they-open kind of football.
That’s not a definitive answer, but it is an answer.
Alright. I’ll let you out.
THE SHORTLIST 2024
The Shortlist now has three names on it. They are, as follows:
MIDFIELDERS
As stated in the Yalcouyé edition, Makalou was the last of what we promised were the freebies of this series. You need to subscribe to read the rest, and there are plenty more to come. We can’t wait to keep putting these up.
