Bundesliga: A whole season of just eight minutes for Togolese forward Ihlas Bebou
- panafricafootball
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Ihlas Bebou's statistics this season raise eyebrows at first glance. For anyone who hasn't been following the Togolese striker's news in recent months, this might seem like a mistake or a lack of information updates. And yet, this is not the case. The Hoffenheim center-forward in the Bundesliga has indeed spent an entire season consisting of only eight minutes in total. It's astounding, but it's true.
One game, zero goals, zero assists, zero cards, all in just eight minutes over the 34 matches that will make up the 2024-2025 Bundesliga season. This is the statistics for the lad, who stands at 1.85 m tall and weighs 80 kilos.
Born on April 23, 1994, in Sokodé, a town located 316 kilometers from Lomé, the capital of Togo, Ihlas Bebou arrived in Germany in his early youth. His career took him to Fortuna Düsseldorf II in the Regionalliga in 2014. That same year, he moved to the Bundesliga 2 with Düsseldorf's senior team. He stayed there for four seasons, during which he played 73 matches in total and scored 12 goals and provided 13 assists.
He then spent two seasons at Hannover 96 where he scored 10 goals in 45 appearances. The 31-year-old signed for TSG 1899 Hoffenheim in the summer of 2019 for a seven-year contract. Between 2019 and 2024, he showed remarkable consistency, playing a few times as an attacking midfielder and playing almost every match, with a productivity of 37 goals in all competitions.
With his country, Togo, Ihlas Bebou wore the yellow jersey for the first time in 2017. He played in the Africa Cup of Nations that year and has a total of 38 caps for the Togolese Hawks, with one goal scored.
The terrible afternoon in August 2024 that cast a shadow over the entire upcoming season
The Togolese player, paid €167,000 a month, was at this point with his club, actively preparing for a promising season when in August 2024 he suffered a sudden setback. During the warm-up for a friendly match against Fulham, he injured his knee. The diagnosis predicted three months of unavailability for the Togolese, but in the end, he was sidelined for nine long months.
This injury sidelined him for 281 days, requiring surgery on August 11th, missing a total of 45 club matches. He also missed his national team's matches against Liberia, Equatorial Guinea, Mauritania, and Senegal, despite his club's announcements that he hoped for an imminent return.
A glimmer of hope at the very end of the season
Saturday, May 17, 2025, brought a glimmer of hope to the Togolese player's dark season. As the Bundesliga played its 34th and final matchday of the 2024-2025 season, Ihlas Bebou appeared in the 82nd minute against Bayern Munich, the leaders of the pack.
To a standing ovation from the crowd, he stepped onto the PreZero Arena pitch a little shyly but calmly, his hair braided on his head, a fact that the fans had so sorely missed. Hoffenheim was in a bad way, conceding three goals. The club conceded another goal before the end of the game, against a helpless Ihlas Bebou.
The Togolese player played eight minutes, the only minutes of his entire season where his knee played this nasty trick on him. Better than the final score of this final match, this return to competition is a real satisfaction for the club, but also for the Togolese player, who showed true resilience, setting his sights on the next season, which will see his contract with TSG 1899 Hoffenheim expire.
The striker's return will also be good for the Togo national team, which has been struggling with its performances and has not participated in any international competition since the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations in Gabon.
EDITOR NOTE: This article is translated from the original written in French by Hilary Christelle Tolo Kpadonou for Pan-Africa Football.
