Filippo Mane: Who is Borussia Dortmund's Italian centre-back compared to Mats Hummels?
Jadon Sancho, Jude Bellingham and Erling Haaland all came to Borussia Dortmund to become world-beaters - Italy U20 international centre-back Filippo Mane looks set to follow in their footsteps.
bundesliga.com takes a closer look at a defender who Dortmund believe has the quality to make it to the top.
Age: 19 (born 8 March 2005)
Club: Borussia Dortmund
Position: Centre-back/ right-back
Country: Italy
Key stats
Surely it was Mane's destiny to play for Dortmund. Aged four, and at the urging of his grandfather Marino, Mane joined Vela Mesero, a club on the western side of Milan. The colour of their shirts? Yes, you couldn't make it up: yellow and black.
"It's a great experience, both in football and personal terms," said Mane on arriving at Dortmund in January 2022, having left home to join Sampdoria aged 14. "Since I was young, I've been used to being away from home, and here in Germany I'm being looked after very well."
BVB certainly have faith in the young right-footed centre-back, who can comfortably also play at right-back or in a back three.
"Defensively, he's very strong, very disciplined and wins a lot of duels," explained Dortmund's U19 coach Mike Tullberg. "He can weigh up situations very well, and knows when to move forward and when it's better not to. Going forward, he gets involved in build-up play, but still with a little too high a risk."
While Mane is learning to temper certain instincts, Tullberg listened to his and made Mane U19 captain for the 2023/24 season, despite the youngster having sat out a good chunk of the previous campaign with a muscle injury that meant he missed Italy's U19 EURO win in summer 2023.
Mane then sustained a serious knee injury, but worked his way back to help a side featuring Paris Brunner and fellow Italy youth international Vincenzo Onofrietti to the U19 championship final, even assisting on Brunner's goal in the title-decider they lost to Hoffenheim.
His progress has come as no surprise at BVB. Mane had been on Dortmund's radar in a serious way since September 2021 when he starred in a four-nation U17 tournament involving Germany, Italy, Israel and Belgium in Duisburg.
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Already a first-choice for Sampdoria's U19 team at the highest level of youth football in Italy, his performances less than two months later in a U17 Euro qualifying tournament in Ireland convinced the Bundesliga club to make the move before someone else did.
"We're delighted that in Filippo Mane we have secured another top young talent long term," said then youth academy director Lars Ricken in January 2022. "He's a really great guy who has decided to take the next step at Borussia Dortmund and to learn his trade in the youth academy."
By the start of the 2023/24 season, Ricken was tipping Mane to reach the first team. He has done that in the 2024/25 campaign, even being named on the bench for the UEFA Champions League game against Real Madrid, while he is set to be a regular fixture in the starting XI of the club's reserve team in 3. Liga.
Plays a bit like: Mats Hummels
"Physically fantastic, quick and good in the air," is how Tullberg described Mane, who - with his ability on the ball and penchant for a risk or two with it at his feet - inevitably conjures comparisons with BVB great Hummels.
Intelligent on and off the pitch - he was hoping to study marketing or sports science alongside his football career - Mane's near 6'2" physique and the fact his coach's hand him the captain's armband are other points of comparison with Hummels, who left Dortmund in summer 2024.
Did you know?
He's not related to former Bayern Munich man Sadio, but Filippo's surname does betray a shared Senegalese heritage.
"I love Senegal and when I can, I travel to Dakar to see my uncle and cousins," said Filippo, whose father, Antoine, hails from the west African nation.
He needs help to talk to his relatives, though, as his French is not great. When he arrived in Dortmund, he communicated mostly in English, but by August 2023 was already able to give his first interview in German.
What they're saying
"He's a great guy. In terms of personality, he's fantastic, that's also why we brought him in." - Tullberg
"He's really happy, of course. It all started with him" - Antoine Mane talking about Filippo's grandfather, Marino
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