Smuggled away from poverty in Ivory Coast, tireless Amad Diallo is living his big football dream at Manchester United, via Italy | Football News

In 2017, Italy’s undercover agents arrested a couple from Ivory Coast in Parma. They were allegedly part of a human trafficking ring that sold the European football dream and smuggled children to Italy from West Africa. The couple had two boys in their mid-teens staying with them, Amad and Hamed, both bearing the surname Traore. The couple claimed they were their children, though DNA tests turned up negative. Subsequently, they said they had adopted the children from their close cousins, “to save them from poverty.”
Hamed and Amad—it was proved that they were not blood relatives, forget brothers, either—were from Adjame, a densely-populated suburb of Abidjan with the highest crime rate in the country. The Italian authorities did not deport the teenagers home because the investigators contended that the “children were aware of it and had a reasonable life with their fake parents.” They were playing in a local club—Boca Barco—affiliated with Boca Juniors of Argentina. The court, though, slapped a fine of €48,000 on them in 2021. Soon after Amad dropped “Traore” from his name too.
that time, their footballing careers had already taken flight. Hamed was on Sassuolo’s payrolls while Amad was bedding into his life in Manchester after United had purchased him from Atalanta for roughly €40 million. That the smuggled boys were living their footballing dream in itself was a triumph—and an anomaly in that most of the trafficked barely reach the gates of a football club, but are sold to drug or arms cartels, or simply pushed into streets or seas en route. According to Culture Foot Solidaire, a charity that’s dealing with trafficking, an estimated 15,000 teenagers are illegally snuck into Europe from West Africa under the false pretence of football riches. Not even a third reach Europe. Not even a third of those that reach Europe become a footballer, forget an elite one at that.
Manchester United’s Amad Diallo reacts at the end of the English Premier League soccer match against Liverpool at the Anfield stadium in Liverpool, England. (AP)
Amad, though, is vaulting into the upper echelons of English football. The 12-minute hat-trick against Southampton on Wednesday was the latest vindication of his virtues that have blossomed under new manager Ruben Amorim. Though the feat came against the bottom-placed club in the league, it came when his team was trailing, facing an embarrassment, in the last stretch of a manic game. He had scored other important goals—the winner against Manchester City at the Etihad, the equaliser against Liverpool in Anfield, and the winner against Liverpool in last season’s FA Cup. So much so that he has swiftly become the most important player in the still-nascent Amorim era.
A bench-warmer in the Ten Hag tenure, wherein he served two loan spells too, he has all the attributes Amorim demands from his forward. Amad is quick, robust, skilful, and most of all never tires. Amorim wants his players to “run like mad dogs.” Amad embodies that spirit like no other colleague of his, without compromising on his control.
He keeps running all the time, doesn’t complain if he is not supplied the ball, he casually runs back. He chases lost causes—the goal against City was a classic instance. All his teammates had given up the ball, assuming City would clear the ball in their own half. But Amad pursued, controlled the ball before goalkeeper Ederson did, showed the poise with a glorious first touch that took the ball away from the keeper and then hammered a shot from an acute angle, with such devastating pace and precision that it flew beyond Josko Gvardiol’s sliding studs. So was the hat-trick goal when he snatched the ball from under the defender’s nose.
Manchester United’s Amad Diallo celebrates scoring their fourth goal. (Reuters)
The 22-year-old might not possess the strapping musculature of most modern-day wingers (Amad is 5ft 8 inches). He is a throwback in that sense, rapid, nimble and with a knack of ghosting through the legs of defenders, slipping past them before they realise they had been hoodwinked, with boundless energy and rubbery elasticity. Amorim would praise his traits: “Good physicality is not the size but he can run, and that is a key point in that position. So you try to choose players that you can put in that position and then the technical characterics are perfect for him.”
Apart from heart and fight, he brings another valuable dimension to his club—a left-footed right winger, though as the hat-trick showed he can score off either foot. So when he receives the ball, because he is left-footed, he gets the space to cut inside. Amorim thinks he has the game to play in different roles and in different systems too. Ten Hag has deployed him on the left wing, Amorim as a wingback, wide forward and as a No 10. “He’s very good playing in that position (No 10) but also playing between the lines because he has good control and he seems faster with the ball than without the ball. So it’s something that he has and he is capable of playing in both positions. And he can play in different systems. In the future, we will play in a different system, maybe. So it’s that kind of player that we need in the team,” Amorim observed.
Manchester United’s Amad Diallo celebrates after scoring his side’s first goal during the English Premier League soccer match between Manchester United and Southampton at the Old Trafford stadium in Manchester, England. (AP)
The caretaker manager and a United legend Ruud van Nelrooy raved about his commitment during practice sessions. “Every day after training he comes to me and wants to do extra finishing, extra crossing, ‘How can I improve my heading?’,” Van Nelrooy said. “He’s constantly focused on learning and getting better, living in a professional way and he’s very motivated to get the best out of his career.”
Little wonder that he has blossomed in a progressive environment, seen his wages doubled, and contract extended. “It’s just the start, and I have to improve a lot,” Amad would say after the hat-trick. But it has been some journey though.

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