Mohamed Salah always gives defenders plenty to think about and will do so again as his Egypt side take on Cameroon in the Africa Cup of Nations’ second semi-final.
Joel Matip is one player who is well-versed in the art of defending against Salah, given the pair have played and trained together at Liverpool since Salah’s arrival from Roma in 2017.
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Yet Matip will not be able to help host nation Cameroon tonight (Thursday) in their quest to reach the final on home soil, because he walked away from international football in 2015 aged just 24.
It was long before he signed for Liverpool that Matip decided to stop playing at international level. His 27th and final appearance was in an AFCON qualifier against The Gambia in September 2015.
Even on that occasion, he had to be tempted back into the fold by then-coach Volker Finke.
That match remains the only time he has played for Cameroon since the 2014 World Cup over a year earlier, where they finished bottom of their group after defeats to Mexico, Croatia and hosts Brazil. Matip scored Cameroon’s only goal of a miserable campaign, and the only one of his international career — a tap-in from four yards to equalise in a 4-1 loss to Brazil in their final match.
Born in the German city of Bochum, Matip qualifies for Cameroon through his father Jean, who moved to Germany from the central African nation with a chemistry degree to make a new life and met Matip’s mother, Eva-Maria, while he was continuing his studies.
Matip was just 18 when he made his senior international debut, against Italy, in March 2010, less than four months after breaking into the Schalke first team. He was part of their World Cup squad in South Africa three months later, making one appearance — as a midfielder — in a 1-0 loss to Japan as they went out at the group stage without earning a single point.
By the time he completed a Bosman transfer to Liverpool after his Schalke contract expired in the summer of 2016, it had already been almost a year since his last appearance for Cameroon. He made it clear he had no intention of ending his self-imposed international exile and did not wish to be considered for selection for the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations in Gabon.
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However, that did not stop Hugo Broos, Cameroon coach at the time, from trying to change his mind.
“When I took over, I went to see him in Gelsenkirchen (the city where Schalke play) and asked him to return to the team,” Broos told Belgium’s Voetbal Magazine in December 2016.
“But he said to me, ‘Nothing is organised properly in Cameroon’. I asked him to give me a chance to prove that we could do it better but he was not convinced.
“But in the meantime, I’ve heard that he is now prepared to make a comeback and so I am going to go and see him again.”
A few days later Matip, who had made an impressive start to life at Anfield, reassured Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp that his stance was unchanged.
Liverpool thought that was the end of the matter, but Cameroon then named Matip in their provisional 35-man squad for the tournament. The call-up was turned down but confusion reigned.
“Joel Matip does not want to play with the Lions at the moment due to a bad experience with the previous technical staff,” said Broos, who accused Matip of “privileging personal interest to the detriment of the national team”.
The stakes were raised further when the Cameroon Football Federation warned it “reserves the right to take action in accordance with FIFA regulations”. In effect, they argued that if Matip was going to refuse their call-up then he should not be allowed to play for Liverpool for the duration of their involvement in AFCON, and lodged a complaint with FIFA.
Liverpool then asked FIFA to provide some clarity, but none was forthcoming. A FIFA spokesman said: “A player who has been called up by his association for one of its representative teams is, unless otherwise agreed by the relevant association, not entitled to play for the club with which he is registered during the period for which he has been released or should have been released under the provisions of this annexe, plus an additional period of five days.”
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The game’s global governing body also warned that “any potential violation of the applicable provisions would need to be investigated by the FIFA disciplinary committee”.
Bemused and infuriated in equal measure, Liverpool sought legal advice. Frustrated in their attempts to confirm his eligibility with FIFA, Liverpool decided they had no option but to leave Matip out of a Premier League clash with Manchester United at Old Trafford in January 2017. He also sat out the following midweek’s FA Cup replay win over Plymouth Argyle.
Belatedly, he was given the green light to feature in Liverpool’s next game, against Swansea City, after FIFA finally ruled Cameroon had no hold over the player.
Cameroon went on to lift the trophy, beating Egypt in the final. Afterwards, Broos aimed a dig at Matip and other players who had decided not to join the squad. “There was a lot of trouble before, players who wouldn’t come with us,” he said. “Maybe they are saying now to themselves, ‘Shit! Why didn’t I go with them?’.”
However, Matip insisted he had no regrets and the sorry saga only strengthened his resolve never to play for Cameroon again.
Now 30, he is famed for his laid-back nature among Klopp’s squad but he is also strong-minded and a man of principle.
“I did not understand what was going on around me. I only wanted to stay here at Liverpool and play,” he told The Times in 2017. “I tried to play and represent my country, do my best and achieve something, but all the surrounding things were not the best.
“I always tried it and tried it. I spoke to the old coach a lot and he always tried to change some things. I said, ‘OK, I will try it again’. I tried it again and again and, at one moment, you have to say it is enough. You cannot keep saying, ‘Maybe next time it will get better, it will get better’.
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“It is Africa, and you can never compare it to European things. I never compared it. I am not talking about the hotel or having the perfect pitch. It is not that I want something special. But it would have been good if all the people only thought the most important thing was to win something and to achieve. And not everyone thinking about what is best for themselves.”
In March 2019, seven months into his spell as Cameroon coach and with another AFCON looming that summer, Dutch great Clarence Seedorf was the next to try to bring Matip back into the set-up.
“Before the 2019 tournament, Seedorf called Matip and another defender, Nicolas Nkoulou (now in the Premier League with Watford), who had retired from international duty after winning the final in 2017,” Daniel Ekonde, a sports journalist based in Cameroon, tells The Athletic.
“This felt like a second chance for Matip to come back, but he decided against it (champions Cameroon went out at the last-16 stage, losing 3-2 to Nigeria). Ever since, they have decided not to call him, and here we are. Cameroon are moving along. Now we have Michael Ngadeu-Ngadjui (of Belgian club Gent), who is a pillar in the central defence. We have Jean-Charles Castelletto, who is with Nantes. People don’t worry that Matip isn’t there.”
In December, though, rumours circulated that Matip could return for this year’s AFCON.
Five-time winners Cameroon were hosting the African championship for the first time in 50 years. The recent election of former Barcelona hero Samuel Eto’o as president of Cameroon’s Football Federation had led to reports he could be persuaded to end his long exile.
But speaking before the match against Newcastle on December 16, Klopp flatly rejected that prospect.
“He doesn’t consider it (returning to international football),” the Liverpool manager said.
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Since Matip last played for Cameroon, he has won the Champions League, Premier League and UEFA Super Cup with Liverpool (he was out injured for their Club World Cup triumph just over two years ago), while establishing himself as one of the best defenders in arguably the world’s best domestic league.
“Trust me, the fans do respect him,” Ekonde says. “They respect his decision to no longer represent Cameroon. They know it is a problem between him and the federation. The fact he is not featuring for Cameroon is no longer an issue.
“For the Africa Cup of Nations in 2017, people weren’t happy with Matip, but once they saw how solid the defence was, they forgot about him. It is the same thing happening now in the 2022 tournament.
“If Matip was playing, he would have helped because he has been playing alongside Mohamed Salah at Liverpool. It would have been great to watch them against each other too. But he’s not there and Cameroon are moving forward.”
(Top photo: Adrian Dennis/AFP via Getty Images)