At 19 years old, Assane Diao carries the weight of the spectacular emergence he carried out last season. Manuel Pellegrini gave him the alternative and the attacker of Senegalese origin surprised everyone by scoring three goals in his first three games as a starter (two in LaLiga and one in the Europa League). Then, however, he was only able to score one more goal in the first round of the Copa del Rey and finished the campaign with a secondary role in ‘Ingeniero’s’ plans, which He was routinely relegated to substitute duty. A situation that cannot be turned around at the moment.
After proclaiming European champion under 19 Last summer, the young footballer born in Ndongane returned with his batteries charged, with the firm intention of earning a place in the green and white first team despite the siren songs about his possible departure. But the beginning of the course is not what I expected. In LaLiga he has participated in 7 of the 14 games played and has only started in two of thembeing used at the start as a forward in the absence of troops in the vanguard. Meanwhile, in the Conference League he has been a starter in the five matches played, including the previous play off, although only in the last one against Celje did he start, reaching Between all competitions only 448 minutes, three assists and one goal, the one achieved against the modest CD Gévora in the KO tournament.
With those numbers, it is not surprising that The possibility of a change of scenery is once again on the table for the January market. During last summer, in fact, there were already several interested clubs, such as Nottingham Forest, Brentford, Leipzig or, in Spain, Getafe and Villarreal. However, those who bet the strongest were Porto (willing to pay 7.5 million euros for 50% of his transfer), as well as Hoffenheim (which proposed a paid loan with a purchase option) andl Feyenoord, whose offer (between 10 and 11 kilos) was satisfactory in Heliópolis, although it was the player himself who decided not to go out.
“What you have to do is support him”
But there are voices that still trust Assane Diao. One of them, more authoritative, is that of Miguel Calzado, director of the Heliópolis club’s quarry, who believes that you just have to give him confidence so that he can once again demonstrate what he is capable of doing in the elite. “I think that what we have to do for this boy is to support him. The difficult thing is not to get there, but to stay. Why is it difficult to maintain? Because you arrive, normally when you go up to the first team it is because you are doing quite well in the reserve team. You are one of the most outstanding players, that’s why you go up to the first team, you come with confidence, you have a good debut, but then you have to maintain that demand. AND That requirement must be maintained not only from Sunday to Sunday, but also during the week, because you compete with top people like us.. We have internationals, world champions… You also go from the head of a mouse to the tail of a lion, because you are the last, let’s say. There are people with much more hierarchy and much more weight. Everything that is generated around you, both from the press and from family, you go from no one knowing you to everyone knowing you… All of that is difficult to manage. I think heThe only way to manage it is to support them and talk a lot with them so that they don’t fall apart. And hey, if you’ve done it once, why not do it more times? But it is not easy, that is why getting there is not so simple. In the end, the head and the mind are quite important to stay in the elite,” explained the person responsible for the lower ranks in Relief.
The importance of mental work
In this sense, Calzado admitted that Betis works a lot on the mental aspect so that its players are prepared to face situations like the one the under-21 international is going through. “This is what we try, not only in these cases, but alsoand we are trying to prepare for all those emotions that a player his age can suffer in the future.. Because in the end the emotions… No, I don’t want to be afraid. That’s a human thing. You’re going to be afraid. Someday you will have it. What do you have to educate the players? So that that fear or that ego or that those doubts that you may have do not limit you in your performance.. Of course, that’s easy to say. You try to minimize it, but then day to day life is difficult and that requires continuous work. If you don’t do all that work continuously, in the end we are people and each one with our personality and our characteristics, and not everyone handles it the same way,” he said.