Silas Katompa Mvumpa should bring back the lightness that VfB has lost this season. His injury is another setback. VfB has to hold the class without him.
It’s a Friday evening at the end of November and in the Mercedes-Benz Arena in Stuttgart, even those VfB supporters who are known as “bruddlers” because of their morose disposition have risen from their seats with a clapping clapping. More than 20,000 VfB fans showered applause on a player who hadn’t done more that night than put on his jersey and tie his shoelaces. The player, Silas Katompa Mvumpa, had not played at all. It was his mere existence and the sign that he was about to come on that delighted the fans. Silas played five minutes after being out eight months earlier due to a cruciate ligament rupture. The audience celebrated each of his ball contacts, singing about him with chants. VfB, 16th, won 2-1 against Mainz after three defeats in a row – Silas was back and with him hope in Swabia.
Silas is out for the entire season
Almost exactly three months later, Silas, 23 years old, is sitting on the lawn of the Stuttgart Arena: face contorted in pain, his right hand on his left shoulder. Silas is injured again. In the 1-1 draw against VfL Bochum, Danilo Soares bumped into him. At first glance, the scene seemed rather harmless until the offensive player sat down on the lawn and finally had to be substituted. It turned out that the Congolese has torn several ligaments in his shoulder. He underwent surgery and will be out for the entire season. He posted on Instagram that the surgery went well. “The hardest part has started now and I have to be patient but with time and determination I will make it,” he wrote in French. He’s out for four months.
VfB lacks the lightness that characterizes Silas
Silas, he was one of those players that everyone who supported VfB had talked about with hope and longing during a difficult season. Sports director Sven Mislintat said after the diagnosis: “This is extremely bitter news for Silas and VfB. Silas was on the way back to his old strength after his cruciate ligament rupture.” Last season he had scored eleven goals and presented five. He scored his eleventh goal in January 2021 against Mainz. He took the ball from his own penalty area, guided it 80 meters across the field close to his foot, let several Mainzers stand lightly and shot against the direction of the goalkeeper.
On the soccer field, Silas exudes the ease of a child just playing. Together with striker Sasa Kalajdzic, who had scored 16 goals in the previous season, he stood for a VfB Stuttgart that, like the 5-1 win in Dortmund, offered furious football. Sometimes Silas was prone to gimmicks, for example when he stood in front of the empty goal against Bremen and provocatively slowly pushed the ball over the line as if he were on a football field. Some saw that as disrespectful. Silas apologized.
Cruciate ligament tear and mistaken identity: Silas turbulent year
In March 2021 he tore his cruciate ligament. In June he revealed with the club that he had played under a false identity for two years. The club declare that Silas Wamangituka, as he was known until then, is called Silas Katompa Mvumpa. The date of birth initially given (October 6, 1999) was also incorrect. Instead, he was born on October 6, 1998. Behind it, so the VfB told the story, the “machinations of his former player agent”, who wanted to earn money from Silas. At the time, Silas was quoted as saying: “I’ve lived in constant fear in recent years and I’ve also been very worried about my family in Congo. It was a difficult step for me to reveal my story.” The sports court of the DFB imposed a fine and a ban of three months. Silas had to sit out anyway because of his knee injury.
VfB must hold the class without Silas
In November 2021 he made his debut for VfB after his injury break. In February 2022, little is left of the euphoria that emanated from his substitution that Friday evening in the Mercedes-Benz Arena. VfB, seventeenth in the table, has to do without its Dauflos player in the relegation battle. He will be back in four months, then the preparations for the new season will start. If you include his cruciate ligament tear, Silas will be out for a year. At VfB, they don’t expect Silas to lose his enjoyment of the game as a result. However, it remains to be seen in which league he will then be able to show his skills.
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