Former Liverpool striker Mario Balotelli has told Mamadou Sakho to leave the club and join him at Nice to kick-start his career again.
The French defender has yet to feature this season as a failed drugs test last season coupled with issues during the club’s summer pre-season tour has seen Jurgen Klopp freeze him out of the first-team squad.
Having fallen down the pecking order at Anfield, it looks unlikely that he’ll force his way back into the German tactician’s plans any time soon, and in turn Balotelli believes that he would benefit from following the same path that he took where he is now enjoying his football again.
“I speak with him from time to time. I said to him: ‘What a waste a player like you is not playing’,” he told TF1.
“He has to leave. I said to him: ‘If you want, come to Nice.’ I am going to speak to him about it. In January, it would be good.”
Balotelli has scored six Ligue 1 goals for Nice so far this season, helping them to top spot in the standings with 29 points from 12 games, three points more than Monaco and Paris Saint-Germain.
In turn, not only would a move to Nice potentially offer Sakho the chance of regular first-team football, but he would also be joining a club with surprise ambitions of winning the league this season, such has been the impressive nature of their start to the campaign.
Quality additions in January will be important and could ensure that they don’t slip up, and so it remains to be seen whether or not the club and Sakho follow Balotelli’s idea and make it happen in the New Year.