On Tuesday it was announced by Liverpool FC, via their website, that Chris Mavinga will be playing for Rennes next season. Mavinga confirmed it on his own Twitter account shortly after.
So what are Rennes getting? An injury prone leftback with hardly any first team experience? Or a pacey tackler with bags of enthusiasm and a winning mentality?
Mavinga started his career in English football in 2009, when he joined Liverpool straight from Paris-Saint Germain. He spent three years at PSG's Camp Des Loges before departing for Merseyside.
The main reason for Mavinga leaving PSG, he said, was down to a lack of a support structure for the teams youth. This is slightly baffling as the U18 team were only beaten to the Championnat National title by Marseille's U18 team. Another reason cited, for his move to Liverpool, was the unapproachable attitude of some of PSG's senior players. After the sacking of Paul Le Guen, PSG's manager at the time, Mavinga grew irrevocably disillusioned with the club. Despite interest from Arsenal and a tabled contract from PSG, he chose to sign for Liverpool.
What was PSG's loss was Liverpool's gain right?
Er, not quite. Mavinga didn't actually feature in a competitive match for Liverpool in the two years he was signed at the club.
He trained with the reserves for most of his 2009 season, before moving to train with the first team at the end of the season.
Following the sacking of Rafael Benitez, Mavinga publically stated his frustration at the lack of first team opportunities and his subsequent return to reserve team training under regressive coach Roy Hodgson.
Whilst his public strop angered innumerable fans of the Merseyside outfit, he always seemed a fringe player, often forgotten and never considered.
On 10th December Liverpool announced a loan agreement was being sought with Belgian high fliers Racing Genk. There had been initial interest from Turkish club Antalyaspor, even a reportedly accepted bid yet Genk was the preferred choice. It was a mutually beneficial move as Mavinga realised first team action and Liverpool had a chunk of wages off the bill, for a short while at least.
A deal was finally agreed on 11th January 2010. Mavinga played his first professional match of his career on 19th February coming on as a 90th minute substitute against Mechelen, the team won 1-0. Mavinga failed to appear in the next six matches, yet when he again started, against Club Brugge, it sparked a run in the side for the remaining seven matches. Losing only once, drawing once and winning five.
This run in to the end of the season saw Mavinga pick up three of his four yellow cards, something of a firebrand as he received a yellow card every two games.
Mavinga started to really come into some fine form in those seven matches, yet an incident that occurred in the draw against Standard Liege, would affect his confidence.
Chasing a long ball back to his goal on the left side of the pitch, Mavinga tussled with Mehdi Carcela. The ball bounced and Mavinga tried a high kick to put it out to play, unfortunately, Carcela tried to head the same ball. Mavinga broke Carcela's nose and jaw. The accident shocked Belgian football and shattered Mavinga's confidence. Chris seemed to recover and Carcela has made a full return to football.
The events of that match threatened to overwhelm, what was, a brilliant achievement by Genk and Mavinga. Winning the league was a rather large feather in Mavinga's cap and seemed to endear him to the Liverpool fans just a little more. It was a well fought campaign and a close one too.
Mavinga returned to Liverpool to start training in late June. He tweeted a few times that he was still a Liverpool player, yet the writing was on the wall, the search for a new left back at the club would place him fourth or fifth choice. Several clubs were quoted as being interested, Rennes, Villareal and Genk. It was always going to be a move back to his native country that had the biggest pull.
His international career is certainly set to have an extra boost from his inclusion in the Rennes squad. He has played for France since U18 and was instrumental in the U19 team who won the European Championship in France.
What Rennes have in Mavinga is a left back who can switch to centre back, he has pace, good tackling ability, a winning mentality, a desire to play and the experience of a title push.
Mavinga is no longer a Liverpool player yet I'll follow his career closely, he was always destined to be a fringe player at Anfield and was left behind when Benitez left. Yet he showed industry by going to a foreign league and winning it's highest honour. That's the kind of mentality that any team needs.
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