The 2018/19 Premier League season was a historic one for African players
in English football. More than 130 years after Arthur Wharton became the
first, Sadio Mané and Mohamed Salah shared the Golden Boot with
Arsenal's Gabon striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang in a record-breaking
campaign that saw Liverpool pipped for the title by a point by
Manchester City.
A statue of Wharton now stands at the Football Association's
headquarters at St George's Park - a testament to his status as an
important pioneer of the game. But the story of how it got there, just
like many of the African players who followed in his path such as Steve
Mokone, Albert Johanneson, Peter Ndlovu, Christopher Wreh, Lucas Radebe
and Didier Drogba, is far from straightforward. Ed Aarons describes how
they confronted racism to help change the face of English football
forever, enabling the modern generation of superstars like Mané and
Salah to flourish.
Detailing their remarkable journeys to Anfield from Senegal and Egypt,
Made in Africa also features an exclusive interview with Liverpool
manager Jürgen Klopp - who broke the transfer record for an African
player for the third time in the space of 14 months when he signed Naby
Keïta for almost £53m in August 2017. He explains how the club's African
contingent played an integral role in the thrilling climax to the season
that ended with them becoming European champions for the sixth time.
