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Elye Wahi scored a hat-trick and made a fourth goal on Friday night as Nice beat Rennes 5-2 — two penalties, in the 12th and 34th minutes, a third goal on 73 minutes and the assist for Jonathan Clauss in between. It was the most complete attacking performance by an African player in Europe this weekend, and it happened in the league that produced most of the weekend's African story. France gave the Tracker its hat-trick, its new top scorer and its best young midfielder. England, by contrast, gave it an absence: Mohamed Salah was not in Liverpool's matchday squad at all as Arsenal won 1-0 at Anfield on Sunday to go three points clear at the top of the Premier League.
France: Where the Weekend Was Won
Wahi's hat-trick opened the weekend, and Lassine Sinayoko may have closed the argument about who owns it. The Mali international scored twice and made a third goal as Paris FC beat Monaco 3-1 — his first on 38 minutes, his second on 44, set up by Nigeria's Moses Simon, and an assist for Pagis on 74. Sinayoko now has eight goals in nine Ligue 1 games, the most of any player in the division. At Strasbourg, Morocco's Gessime Yassine scored twice, made a goal and won a penalty in a 5-1 win over Auxerre. And Marseille made it four straight wins by beating Toulouse 2-0, with both goals Moroccan-French: Amine Harit after two minutes, Amine Gouiri on 25. Add Hakimi's hat-trick for Paris Saint-Germain on Friday of last week, and Ligue 1's African contingent has produced the two defining individual performances of the European season so far, ten days apart.
England: The Absentees and the Survivors
The Premier League's weekend turned on who was missing. Salah's absence from Liverpool's squad — the XI, the substitutes and the unused bench were all confirmed without him — came with no public explanation by Sunday night, and Liverpool lost the match that mattered most: Kai Havertz's 16th-minute goal gave Arsenal their first league win at Anfield since 2012. Antoine Semenyo missed Manchester City's 1-0 home defeat by Brighton through injury. Ismaïla Sarr missed Tottenham's 2-0 win over Crystal Palace with a groin problem; his Senegal teammate Pape Matar Sarr did not feature for Spurs either, with no reason reported.
Those who did play left marks. Senegal's Nicolas Jackson scored his fifth Premier League goal in five games to put Aston Villa ahead against Fulham on 39 minutes — eight in 12 appearances in all competitions since his move — before Alex Iwobi's corner forced the equaliser in a 1-1 draw. Ghana's Mohammed Kudus was Tottenham's player of the match, his corner headed in by Gray for the opener against Palace. Nigeria's Taiwo Awoniyi, on his first start since September, scored his first Premier League goal for Coventry City in a 3-1 win over Sunderland that lifted his club out of the relegation zone. Bryan Mbeumo was Manchester United's biggest threat in their 2-0 defeat at Chelsea, hitting the bar late; Dango Ouattara created Brentford's opener in a 2-0 win over Nottingham Forest.
Germany and Italy: The Klassiker and the Derby
The biggest match in Germany needed an African to rescue it. Serhou Guirassy equalised on 60 minutes for Borussia Dortmund in a 2-2 draw at Bayern Munich, moments after Harry Kane had missed a penalty — the Guinea international's eighth goal of the season in all competitions. Morocco's Bilal El Khannouss scored and helped create another as Stuttgart won 4-2 at Bayer Leverkusen, where Algeria's Ibrahim Maza headed the home side's reply. In Italy, the Milan derby belonged to a player of Guinean descent: Diego Moreira made Milan's first two goals and scored the third himself in a 3-1 win over Inter, the first Milan player since Rafael Leão to be involved in three goals in this fixture. And at Juventus, Côte d'Ivoire's Jérémie Boga came off the bench to score on 87 minutes in a 2-0 win over Napoli — only the second African ever to score for Juventus against Napoli in Serie A.
Spain and the Stepping-Stone Leagues
In Spain, Côte d'Ivoire's Yan Diomande scored in Real Madrid's 3-0 win at Racing, Ghana captain Iñaki Williams scored the opener in Athletic Club's 2-1 Basque derby win over Real Sociedad, and Nigeria's Umar Sadiq scored Valencia's winner in a 1-0 victory at Elche. In Turkey, the headline was a milestone: Victor Osimhen headed Galatasaray in front after 12 minutes of a 4-0 win at Konyaspor, his ninth league goal in eight appearances this season — reported in Turkey as his 50th Süper Lig goal for the club. The Tracker labels that figure reported rather than confirmed, and will settle it from Galatasaray's own records this week. That distinction is the whole point of the ledger: nine goals in eight games is verified and remarkable enough on its own.
The Monday Closer
Matchweek 9 closed on Monday night at St James' Park, where Everton beat Newcastle United 1-0. Thierno Barry scored the only goal in the 49th minute, tapping home after Tyrique George's shot squirmed under Newcastle goalkeeper Lukáš Horníček. It was Everton's second win over Newcastle in four days, after Thursday's Carabao Cup victory, and it lifted Everton to seventh in the table.
For the Tracker, the African accounting is narrow but clear. Neither Iliman Ndiaye nor Idrissa Gueye was in Everton's matchday squad. Newcastle's Yoane Wissa, of DR Congo, came on in the 64th minute and was at the centre of the hosts' late push: he flicked on a cross that Anthony Elanga struck against the post, saw a volley on the turn held by Jordan Pickford in the 84th minute, and had a shot on the spin saved by Pickford in stoppage time. Newcastle finished with ten men after substitute Jacob Ramsey was sent off in the 98th minute. With that, Matchweek 9 is complete.
The Ledger
One weekend, accounted for, tells you where African football's centre of gravity sits this autumn. France is producing the volume — Wahi, Sinayoko, Yassine, Harit, Gouiri, Simon — and the form that will decide AFCON 2027 squads: Sinayoko's eight in nine is now the strongest scoring record of any African in a Big Five league this season. Germany and Italy gave the weekend its biggest-match interventions, Guirassy in the Klassiker and Moreira in the Milan derby. England gave it a warning: the continent's biggest star was absent without explanation from the season's biggest fixture so far. Tomorrow, the Tracker turns to that one man in full — Mohamed Salah's hub: his numbers, his contract situation, and what an unexplained absence at Anfield does and does not mean.
