Wilfried Sanou (born 16 March 1984) is a Burkinabé former professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby ...

who played as a winger or striker. He started his career with Planète Champion in his home country before moving to Austria where he played for

Wattens Wattens is a market town of the Innsbruck-Land District in the Austrian state of Tyrol. It is chiefly known as home of the Swarovski crystal glass company. Geography Wattens is located in the Lower Inn Valley of North Tyrol, about east of Innsbr ...

and Tirol Innsbruck. Following a stint at Swiss club

Sion Sion may refer to * an alternative transliteration of Zion People * Sion (name) or Siôn, a Welsh and other given name and surname, including a list of people and fictional characters with the name * Shion or Sion, a Japanese given name Pl ...

he spent many years in Germany's

Bundesliga The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany. At the top of the German football league system, the Bundesliga is Germany's primary footba ...

and 2. Bundesliga with

SC Freiburg Sport-Club Freiburg e.V., commonly known as SC Freiburg () or just Freiburg, is a German football club, based in the city of Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg. It plays in the Bundesliga, having been promoted as champions from the 2. Bund ...

and 1. FC Köln. He ended his career in Japan with

Urawa Red Diamonds , colloquially Urawa Reds (浦和レッズ), also known as Mitsubishi Urawa Football Club from April 1992 to January 1996, is a professional football club in the city of Saitama, part of the Greater Tokyo Area in Japan. The club plays in the J ...

and

Kyoto Sanga FC is a Japanese professional football club based in Kyoto. "Sanga" comes from the Sanskrit word ''sangha'', a term meaning "group" or "club" and often used to denote the Buddhist priesthood, associating the club with Kyoto's many Buddhist templ ...

. At international level, Sanou represented the Burkina Faso national team scoring four goals in 25 matches.

Career

Early career

Sanou was born in

Bobo-Dioulasso Bobo-Dioulasso is a city in Burkina Faso with a population of 904,920 (); it is the second-largest city in the country, after Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso's capital. The name means "home of the Bobo-Dioula". The local Bobo-speaking population (r ...

SC Freiburg

's 2007–08 2. Bundesliga Sanou tore his cruciate ligament on matchday 8 against

Erzgebirge Aue Fußball Club Erzgebirge Aue e.V., commonly known as simply FC Erzgebirge Aue or Erzgebirge Aue (), is a German football club based in Aue-Bad Schlema, Saxony. The former East German side was a founding member of the 3. Liga in 2008–09, ...

which kept him out of action for the rest of the season and limited him to six appearances. With his contract running out at the end of the season, Freiburg were unable to agree a contract extension with Sanou. In his time at the club, he scored five goals in 46

appearances and four goals in 51 2. Bundesliga appearances.

1. FC Köln

In May 2008, 1. FC Köln, newly promoted to the Bundesliga, announced they had agreed a two-year contract Sanou who would arrive on a free transfer.

References

External links

* * * 1984 births Living people People from Bobo-Dioulasso Association football wingers Burkinabé footballers Burkina Faso international footballers 2002 African Cup of Nations players 2010 Africa Cup of Nations players 2013 Africa Cup of Nations players Planète Champion players WSG Tirol players FC Tirol Innsbruck players FC Sion players SC Freiburg players 1. FC Köln players Kyoto Sanga FC players Urawa Red Diamonds players Bundesliga players 2. Bundesliga players J1 League players J2 League players Burkinabé expatriate footballers Burkinabé expatriate sportspeople in Austria Expatriate footballers in Austria Burkinabé expatriate sportspeople in Switzerland Expatriate footballers in Switzerland Burkinabé expatriate sportspeople in Germany Expatriate footballers in Germany Burkinabé expatriate sportspeople in Japan Expatriate footballers in Japan 21st-century Burkinabé people {{BurkinaFaso-footy-bio-stub