Islam Slimani came on late in the final against Senegal and helped Algeria to a 1-0 win in a dramatic final as VAR took away a Senegal penalty. Riyad Mahrez added another trophy to his tally of three English winners medals this season.
Slimani and Mahrez might have seen this as a chance to shine with the former Leicester City winger and now Man City bound, Mahrez showing skills we all remembered so well from the time he spent at King Power Stadium.
Islam Slimani a previous record signing when he joined from Sporting Lisbon back in 2016 for a fee in the region of £28million has never shined as much as everyone would have liked, and spent the last two seasons on loan at Newcastle United and Besiktas.
The two Algerian internationals were never joined by fellow countryman Rachid Ghezzal who had to sit and watch his nation winning that special trophy while performing for Leicester City in the pre-season campaign.
Ghezzal missed out and never got the chance to add more caps to his tally of 16, but hopefully would see this is an incredible achievement as this was the nations second win in this tournament, the last one as far back as 1990.
Riyad Mahrez showed his quality in all games captaining his side to this great victory and might have benefited a lot by being rested so much in his first season at Man City, not always getting the amount of play time that he probably would have liked.
For Islam Slimani this must have been a great victory, being able to score in the early stages and contributing as well as he did. The close future will be exciting either if he has any hope of a “look in” under Brendan Rodgers or will be loaned out or sold before the transfer window shuts.
