Edouard Mendy’s winning the FIFA Best Goalkeeper award for 2021 was not an accident, but rather it was the culmination of years of struggle and diligence. The career of the first goalkeeper of the Senegalese national team was not decorated with roses, but was marred by great difficulties.
Unlike most players, during the first years of his professional career the Chelsea goalkeeper suffered from unemployment and began looking for work outside of football. But Mendy, who was not scouted by anyone, later turned into the most highly-paid African goalkeeper.
Seven years ago, Mendy was looking for a living outside of football, but he did not find a solution other than to seek unemployment compensation in France. The story began in the summer of 2014 when he left the French team Cherbourg, which competed in the third division. He had spent three years with the team, with whom he had his first professional contract after he started with a small team in Le Havre.
After that, Mendy remained for a whole season without a team, during which he found only a return engagement with the Le Havre team, but just to train with the reserve players to maintain his fitness without receiving any wages from the sport, according to previous statements from him. In the evenings, he trained alone in the gym or outside with his brother.
The following season, he had an opportunity that he seized with a little help from his friends. He did a trial period with Marseille’s second team, during which he succeeded in impressing the officials. However, he remained as a backup goalkeeper for this second team, which was competing in the fourth division.
In the 2016/2017 season, Mendy managed to move to the Stade de Reims club, which was competing in the second division. Of course, he was not the first choice because he came from the fourth division, but luck stood on his side, starting with the first match when the first goalkeeper was expelled. Mendy replaced him and showed strong skills during the subsequent matches, but he returned to be the second goalkeeper in most of the remaining matches.
The real breakthrough for Mendy was in the following season when the coach decided to make him the starting goalkeeper and Mendy was able to help the team return to the first division.
In the 2018/2019 season, he contributed to his team's eighth-place but moved in the following season to the Rennes team. For the first time in his life, he moved for a sum of money, which was about 7.6 million euros. He later signed on to Chelsea with a five-year contract for 24 million euros.
Mendy arrived at Chelsea and immediately became their first-choice goalkeeper, forcing Kepa Arrizabalaga to sit on the bench. He has made 70 appearances and played a key role in Chelsea's progression to the top of Europe under Thomas Tuchel.
To cap it all off, Mendy played a starring role in Chelsea’s 1-0 Champions League final triumph against Man City. It was a Champions League season that earned him two places in the record books: Mendy became the first African goalkeeper to lift club football’s most prestigious trophy – while he kept 9 clean sheets, reaching a tie for the Champions League season record with Santiago Canizares in 2000-2001 (then at Valencia) and Keylor Navas in 2015-16 (then at Real Madrid).
The 29-year-old was born in France to a father from Guinea-Bissau and a mother from Senegal – making him eligible to play for all three countries. Guinea-Bissau called Mendy up for a couple of friendly matches in 2016, and he agreed to play for them as an act of homage to his then terminally ill father.
Both Guinea-Bissau and Senegal wanted him to play for them in the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations. Mendy chose the latter, telling journalists he had “always wanted” to play for Senegal, “my mother’s home country.”
Senegal has every reason to be grateful for Mendy’s decision – especially because its strong defensive line is a major factor in making it a favorite to take the trophy, boasting the formidable presence of Napoli’s star centre-back Kalidou Koulibaly alongside PSG’s talented left-back Abdou Diallo. With a talismanic presence up front in the shape of Liverpool winger Sadio Mané, Senegal is set to be a fearsome presence in Cameroon.
Mendy says that the days of unemployment were difficult and he had doubts at the time about his success in football, but he received support from his family. Today, Mendy has become not only a successful goalkeeper, but one of the most skilled goalkeepers in the English Premier League and has been named the winner of FIFA's Best Goalkeeper award for 2021.
