Rightly or wrongly, Malang Sarr had been written off, even by his own manager by the time that his stint at Chelsea came to an end. Infamously, Mauricio Pochettino responded “Who’s that?” when he fielded a question about Sarr, who was part of the Argentine’s extremely bloated squad at Stamford Bridge. The defender did not take the snub well. “I took it badly. It shouldn’t have happened. He knew me. He even tried to sign me at Tottenham. I didn’t ask for an explanation,” he responded, following the mutual termination of his contract at Chelsea. A free agent, Sarr’s career was at a crossroads, and he was left wanting to make up for what he called “lost time” at the London club. 

He has used that failure to fuel a comeback in Ligue 1. Sarr looked out of his depth at Chelsea and his loan spell at AS Monaco in the 2022/23 season didn’t prove to be a springboard for greater things; quite the opposite, he returned to Chelsea with his reputation more damaged than ever. Naturally, his spell with the Principality club also shaped perceptions in France. He left formative club OGC Nice back in 2020, highly rated, but he was a shadow of his former self when he returned to L’Héxagone.

Sarr among Europe’s best for interceptions

A free agent, he was a low-risk bet for Lens. Performances following his arrival at Lens last summer were mixed, but they improved as the season progressed, and following Facundo Medina’s summer departure, he has not only become a regular under new manager Pierre Sage, but he has also become one of their key performers.

Sarr ranks top in Ligue 1, and in fact top in Europe’s top five leagues, at the time of writing, for interceptions, whilst he also ranks in the top 10 in Ligue 1 for dribblers tackled. His anticipation of the game make him indispensable for Sage, who is a cornerstone of the defence for table-topping Lens, whose defence is the best in the division.

Les Sang et Or are the surprise story of the Ligue 1 season, and the club’s ability to breathe fresh life into the likes of Odsonne Édouard, Florian Thauvin, and, of course, Sarr, are a major element of that success. The Chelsea chapter is now definitively behind him and at Lens, he is certainly making up for lost time.