The Mali international has called time on his career, one in which he never quite lived up to the sizeable expectation placed on his shoulders
It was a heady time for Liverpool fans, the summer of 2005.
Fresh off an unexpected – and frankly quite miraculous – Champions League triumph over AC Milan in Istanbul, the club set about the task of cementing its place within the elite. For all the exhilaration of that night at the Ataturk Stadium, a repeat of the fifth-place finish in the league the season prior would simply not do.