Rabat – Former France international Adil Rami has criticized Senegal head coach Pape Thiaw following the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) final against Morocco.
Speaking during a live on his Instagram account, Rami did not hold back in his reaction to what happened around the match and the statements that followed.
“He’s a hypocrite, yes, a hypocrite and manipulative,” Rami said when talking about the Senegal coach. “It’s crazy. The man planned everything.”
Rami claimed that Thiaw had already started building a narrative before the final was even played.
🚨Adil Rami 🇲🇦: 🗣 “Pape Thiaw🇸🇳 est un hypocrite et un manipulateur honte à lui”
👉🏻L’entraîneur sénégalais avait tout préparé bien avoir le match deux jours avant, il avait déjà commencé à chercher des excuses… pic.twitter.com/tOrXybXaZJ
— Mohamed Larbi (@Mohamedlarbi123) March 24, 2026
“He was already looking for excuses two days before the match,” he said. “He wanted to mislead everyone against Morocco with his words.”
Despite his strong criticism of the coach, he was careful to separate that from his view of Senegal overall.
“I have many Senegalese friends, I love Senegal,” he said. “There is no problem. This doesn’t change anything. Don’t mix things up.”
He then returned to his main point, clarifying that his issue was with the coach’s behavior, not the team or the country.
The reaction reflects how the final has gone beyond a simple football result. It has become a wider debate involving players, coaches, and public figures, each giving their own interpretation of what happened
Last week, on March 17, the Confederation of African Football (CAF) Appeal Board officially ruled that the Senegalese team’s conduct constituted a forfeiture of the AFCON 2025 final, thus crowning Morocco the AFCON champions by a score of 3-0.
However, with Senegal set to take the case to CAS, the situation is still far from over.