ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (July 25, 2018) — If you were impressed with new Tampa Bay Rowdies defender Papé Diakité’s performance in his club debut on Saturday night, wait until you hear about the week he had leading up to it.
New signings always involve a lot of moving parts, particularly when the player is overseas. Plane tickets must be purchased and visas must be applied for, in addition to all the standard red tape involved with contracts and registering players with the league office.
Diakité was home in his native Senegal last week when he agreed to sign with the Rowdies, setting the whole process in motion.
While his future teammates were playing in Cincinnati on Saturday, July 14, Diakité was packing his bags for the trans-Atlantic move. While they were making the two-hour flight home to Tampa Bay from Cincinnati, Diakité was embarking on a much longer trip.
He flew eight hours from Dakar to New York and then boarded a three-hour flight to Tampa Bay, arriving Sunday afternoon.
After such a long journey, a nice, relaxing Monday would have been nice.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t on the docket.
Once his physical was completed first thing Monday morning, Diakité was straight into his new Rowdies uniform to play in a closed-door scrimmage in sweltering mid-morning heat at Al Lang Stadium. Diakité played 45 minutes, giving the Rowdies coaching staff a chance to see him play in person and assess his physical condition.
While the majority of his teammates underwent a regular training session Tuesday, Diakité and the group of players that had played Monday participated in a recovery session.
On Wednesday morning, Diakité finally got to train with the full Rowdies roster for the first time. In a normal week, Wednesday is the most grueling session for the players before the intensity of training is pared down to get everybody fresh and ready for the upcoming match.
Because of that, Thursday was another recovery session.
Fridays before Saturday matches are very light, more like a walkthrough for the match than a proper training session.
By the time kickoff of Saturday night’s match rolled around, Diakité had only really trained with the Rowdies once.
“I had one and a half training sessions before I made my debut,” Diakité said. “It was pretty crazy. I don’t think a lot of people know that. I always play with passion and with hunger, so it didn’t matter to me that I was tired and hadn’t really gotten to train with my new teammates.”
Throw in all the off-field stuff — paperwork, moving into a new apartment, video and photo shoots — and it was a taxing week for Diakité. It’s understandable why he started suffering from cramps around the 70th minute and ultimately exited the match in the 84th.
“It’s a rough time (joining a new club,)” Diakité said. “I didn’t get as much rest as I needed and the humidity was tough to deal with. I was dead. I felt fine fitness-wise, but I just felt heavy-legged because of the humidity and travel.”
You wouldn’t have known that by watching him play Saturday night, when he bossed the Indy Eleven attack around to the tune of eight clearances and two interceptions. To help the Rowdies win in his debut made all the hassle worth it.
“It feels great because I got a win with my new teammates,” Diakité said. “They helped me a lot and especially the coach and Joe (Cole) talking to me all the time on the field. It felt great that we scored early, it gave me a lot of confidence in my debut. The fans were amazing and I’d like to thank them for my warm welcome. It was a great debut.”
