Nigerian pundit Efan Ekoku has said that Liverpool should not have sold Sadio Mane to Bayern Munich, calling him ‘arguably Liverpool’s best player for five years’.

Ekoku praised Mane for making the step up from Southampton to Liverpool without missing a beat, calling it a ‘huge’ jump and lauding the Senegalese wide man’s mentality.

While he acknowledges that Mohamed Salah is Liverpool’s ‘best goal scorer’ he maintains that Mane was the Reds’ ‘best player’ and that ‘nobody disagrees with that’.

What did Efan Ekoku say regarding Sadio Mane?

Speaking on the BBC Match of the Day Top 10 Africa Podcast, Ekoku said: “He surprised almost everybody, he looked a good player then at Southampton, but did anyone have [Sadio] Mane in the top five African players in the world at that time? Nobody would say yes.

“The jump from Southampton to Liverpool is huge, to make that jump and be the talisman and to be arguably Liverpool’s best player for five years is what Mane was.

“Everyone I’ve spoken to in the last six months says Liverpool kept their best goalscorer in [Mohamed] Salah, but they sold their best player, nobody disagrees with that.”

Was Sadio Mane the best player at Liverpool upon his departure?

Liverpool had a formidable front three for several years, comprised of Salah, Mane and Roberto Firmino. Now, only Salah remains at the club, with talents such as Luis Diaz and Darwin Nunez having been brought in to replace them.

They each played an integral role to the system – however, their replacements have shown that they were not completely invaluable to the team. Only Salah has yet to be replaced – as such, this seems to indicate that he was the best of the three.

When Mane and Salah’s goalscoring records are examined, it shows that Mane found the back of the net 111 times in 263 games, while Salah scored 144 Premier League goals in 239 games.

This season, Mane has scored six goals and has notched up two assists for Al-Nassr in the Saudi Pro League – meanwhile, Salah has five goals and four assists for Liverpool in the Premier League thus far.