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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Kaamil Ahmed and Borso Tall in Dakar

‘They killed my only son’: the young west African footballers scammed by fake agents

A young man in goalkeeping kit
Cheikh Touré, a promising young goalkeeper, was just 18 when he was found dead in October. Photograph: TikTok/@kheusch51

The last time Diodo Sokhna spoke to her teenage son, he seemed subdued, his voice sapped of all the optimism he had set off with on a journey supposed to put him on the road to a career as a professional footballer.

After that call Cheikh Touré went silent. His mother’s WhatsApp messages to his phone received only the dreaded single tick, indicating they had not been received. Soon afterwards a man with a foreign accent rang her from a number she did not recognise. He told Sokhna her son was dead and then hung up.

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