Tottenham Hotspur are blessed with a number of talented midfielders, one of them being Pape Matar Sarr. While he may not the most high profile player, here’s a handy guide to everything you need to know about the young Spurs star.
A lot has changed in the Tottenham midfield since Ange Postecoglou took over as manager in June 2023, with players leaving and arriving. One player who has really benefitted from the management of the Spurs boss is Pape Matar Sarr.
He has steadily climbed the pecking order for the Lilywhites, and is now a really useful and influential player. But, who is Pape Sarr exactly?
Where did Spurs sign Pape Matar Sarr from?
Tottenham signed Sarr from French outfit FC Metz in 2021, however, he did not officially arrive in North London until a year later, in the summer of 2022.
The youngster cost Spurs roughly £14m at the time. The decision was made to leave Sarr on loan at Metz for another year before introducing him into the fold at Tottenham.
He made 59 appearances for Metz, scoring five goals and registering three assists. Before that, he came through the ranks at Académie Génération Foot in Senegal, moving to France in 2020.
Sarr was brought to Tottenham by former managing director of football Fabio Paratici, who admitted in September 2021 that Spurs had secured the signing of “one of the most talented in Europe”.
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Pape Matar Sarr’s Tottenham career
Sarr had to be patient early on at Tottenham since he wasn’t given many opportunities to play under Antonio Conte. yet his career has flourished thanks to Postecoglou.
With Conte at the helm, Sarr was limited to bit-part substitute appearances, and only managed to rack up 17 appearances (totalling 646 minutes) across all competitions in the 2022/23 campaign.
This did include, however, a very impressive 90 minutes in the 1-0 defeat against AC Milan in the Champions League. Sarr was hailed as Tottenham’s best performer on the night in that game.
Since Postecoglou’s arrival at the club, Sarr has been part of the rotation between Yves Bissouma and Rodrigo Bentancur in the deeper midfield roles.
He has started to add goals to his game, and is able to impact the matches he is involved in with his composure, work ethic, and vision. At the time of writing, Sarr had registered five goals and six assists for the Lilywhites.
Pape Matar Sarr’s wages and market value
After a nice pay rise last year, Pape Matar Sarr is thought to earn around £70,000 per week at Tottenham.
That’s according to data from Capology, who reveal Sarr is now paid £3.64m per year, which puts him on par with the likes of Brennan Johnson, and just behind Destiny Udogie, Fraser Forster, Guglielmo Vicario, Archie Gray, and Rodrigo Bentancur (who all earn £75k per week).
Sarr was previously earning a reported £15,000 per week on his original deal at Spurs, but signed a new contract that saw him commit his future to the club until 2030.
As per information from Transfermarkt, the 22-year-old is worth €45m, which equates to roughly £37.6m. That means Spurs have already more than doubled their investment in the Senegal star.
Sarr is a versatile midfielder
Pape Matar Sarr is a central midfielder, to put it simply. But, he’s capable of playing as a number 6, 8, or even pushing up as a makeshift 10 at times.
His strength, athleticism, and impeccable reading of the game make him an ideal holding midfielder, and he’s really adept at breaking up play and turning defence into attack.
However, his best role is arguably as an 8, where he is able to dictate the flow of the game a little more and use his creativity. Sarr has great stamina, and is brilliant at carrying the ball, making him a really useful box-to-box midfielder.
Postecoglou has employed Sarr as an out-and-out playmaker before, though, and he is pretty useful in that role. While he’s perhaps not as fluid or as adventurous as the likes of James Maddison and Dejan Kulusevski, Sarr offers lots of energy and intelligence in the hole behind the strikers.
Sarr becoming a star for Senegal in international football
Since making his international debut in March 2021, Sarr has racked up 24 caps for Senegal to date and is now a regular for his country.
Just like at club level, Sarr has had to be patient when it comes to representing Senegal. After his debut, he remained a part of the Senegal squad in every international break, but was largely an unused substitute for the next two years.
He was not included in the squad for the African Cup of Nations in January 2023 but, by the end of the year, after his successful integration into Postecoglou’s squad, Sarr was brought back into the national team.
He hasn’t looked back since, featuring heavily in the AFCON journey for Senegal at the start of 2024, and being involved in all but one of their AFCON qualifiers through the summer and the last two international breaks.
Pape Matar Sarr’s personal information and social media
Pape Matar Sarr was born on September 14, 2002, making him 22-years-old at the time of writing. He was born in Thiaroye, Senegal.
Sarr is 1.84m in height, but weighs just 70kg, giving him a very tall, lean, athletic build.
You can find Pape on Instagram, where he has over 822k followers, and he is pretty active on that platform. He also uses Twitter/X fairly regularly, and has just over 191k followers there.