Player #960 for Aston Villa, Mamadou Dialla Sylla played as a midfielder for the club in the 2020-21 season making his sole appearance in that season’s FA Cup.

Sylla was born on 26 January 2003 and grew up in Granollers, Catalonia before signed with Villa as a 15 year old from UE Canovelles in November 2018.

Sylla was appointed to Sean Verity’s Under 18 squad on arrival before Mark Delaney promoted Sylla to the first team squad and giving him his first team debut in the 2020-21 season aged 17 in the 1-4 FA Cup defeat to Liverpool on Friday, 8 January 2021.

Sylla was part of the youngest ever team to ever take the field for Villa in a professional game - aged 18.8 years on average - after the first team squad was forced into isolation due to the COVID-19 pandemic which had seen a raft of players and staff testing positive for the virus in the week preceding the game.

Sylla was also one of 16 debutants in the game - the most in a single game in Villa’s history and was also part of the starting XI made up of 11 debutants, the first time this had happened since Villa’s first professional fixture - also in the FA Cup - on Saturday, 13 December 1879 against Stafford Road. Sylla made his debut appearance under caretaker manager Mark Delaney following Dean Smith having to join the first team in isolation.

The Birmingham Mail described Sylla’s debut thus:

“Villa’s dogged defensive midfielder was superb. The Barcelona-born Guinea native put himself about and launched into challenges for the claret and blue cause. His positioning was text-book as well as he refused to get dragged out of position.”

Mamadou would be released from the Villa Youth set up under Dean Smith in August 2021, aged 18.