Liverpool transfer news: Mamadou Sakho risks season on the sidelines by rejecting Besiktas

The France international defender has been advised to leave Anfield on loan in order to save his future at the club

Mark Critchley
Wednesday 31 August 2016 20:56 BST
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Sakho has not played for Liverpool since April
Sakho has not played for Liverpool since April (Getty)

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Mamadou Sakho has risked spending a season on the sidelines at Liverpool by rejecting another loan move away from the club.

The France international has turned down a temporary move to Besiktas, having already decided against loans to West Bromwich Albion and Stoke City.

According to the Daily Mirror, Sakho is hoping to waiting for an offer from either France or Italy.

Sakho has been advised to leave Anfield for the remainder of the season in order to prove his fitness and professionalism to Jürgen Klopp, the Liverpool manager.

Sakho, a popular figure among supporters despite not playing for Liverpool since last April, has endured a torrid four months off-the-pitch.

The 26-year-old defender was provisionally suspended at the end of last season in an anti-doping probe, causing him to miss the club’s Europa League final defeat to Sevilla.

The ban also led to him being omitted from Didier Deschamps’ France squad for this summer’s European Championships.

Sakho was cleared in July after his legal team successfully argued that the substance he was alleged to have taken was not prohibited.

In the weeks after the case was dropped, however, Sakho was sent home from Liverpool’s pre-season tour of the United States by Klopp after displaying a lack of professionalism.

Sakho arrived late for the squad’s airport departure, missed a physiotherapy session and then turned up late for a team meal.

After sending Sakho home from the tour last month, Klopp said: "It is how I said, we have some rules and we have to respect them.

"If somebody doesn’t respect it, or somebody gives me the feeling he is not respecting it, then I have to react, that’s all.”

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