Paul Mitchell’s long road to Leipzig started in the summer of 2014 when he was director of recruitment for Southampton trying to rebuild a squad that had been ransacked by the Premier League’s top clubs. As well as signing Shane Long, Toby Alderweireld, Graziano Pelle and Dusan Tadic, Mitchell had his eyes on Sadio Mane, a 22-year-old from Senegal who had scored 23 goals for Red Bull Salzburg the previous season.



But when Mitchell and director of football Les Reed negotiated with Ralf Rangnick, the Red Bull sporting director who had discovered Mane playing for Metz in the French second tier, they hit real resistance. “I wouldn’t say (the negotiations) were hospitable,” Mitchell tells The Athletic, almost six years on. “No one wants to lose a good player, but we wanted to sign good players. It was an interesting dialogue between the three people.”



Mitchell and Reed got their way in the end, signing Mane, who of course is...