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Exploration: is a photo series dedicated to the spirit of following one’s whim. Our members will let curiosity lead the way in searching for unique football cultures.
Editorials
Members
Think Tank
Image Licensing
About
Exploration: is a photo series dedicated to the spirit of following one’s whim. Our members will let curiosity lead the way in searching for unique football cultures.
Febuary 1 2026
Scott travels not to tick destinations off a list, but to linger—using football as a compass to navigate unfamiliar cities, small towns, and in-between spaces where the game quietly shapes daily life. Through conversations on touchlines, in cafés, and along long walks to stadiums, football becomes a shared language, a way to listen before speaking.
What follows is less about spectacle and more about proximity. Scott’s images and words move at ground level, attentive to people, rhythms, and moments that reveal how football helps him understand where he is—and how locals understand themselves.
United Academy
While discussing this project with a few LOSC Lille players, the captain Benjamin André gave me the contact of a former Senegalese player he had played with at Stade Rennais F.C: Cheikh Mbengue. I contacted Cheikh, and he welcomed me into Thiès, the city close to Dakar where his academy is located.
When we arrived around 3 p.m., it was 37°C (99°F)! Cheikh welcomed us along with “Doudou,” his long-time collaborator and friend, who is also in charge of recruitment.
We began the visit of a former hotel that had been transformed into a living space for more than 70 young people, all of which greeted us and shook our hands. The rooms were small and could house up to six kids. The weight room looked like a space under construction where a few weights had been placed. In the non-air-conditioned room, there was a table for the physiotherapists next to two barrels used as ice baths for recovery.
After visiting the academy, we were invited to go to the Thiès military base where there sat a synthetic pitch. Training takes place in the middle of the afternoon under crushing heat, and it was here where I took photos from the top of the stands. The call to prayer echoed, and away from prying eyes, I captured one of the academy members praying. Training sessions take place either in the morning or in these afternoons, but never in the evening because there is no lighting.
The four-year-old academy is run by four partners (Cheikh Mbengue, former player; Moussa Sissoko, former player) and holds 72 youth footballers, with ages ranging from from U13 to U19, all of whom go to the associated private schooling—right now, all the students are boys, but they hope to welcome more genders soon. There is a mixed gender academy in Dakar, the Sacrée Cœur Academy, affiliated with Olympique Lyonnais. Women play a lot of football in Senegal, as well as rugby and futsal.
Within the United Academy, there are Senegalese players but also kids from neighboring countries—Gambia, Guinea, Ivory Coast— and around 25 employees: coaches, cooks, steward, cleaner, doctors. Between private schooling, taking care of the children (food, housing, school), staff salaries, and renting the building, the costs are very high. Currently, the United Academy is renting its facilities. One day, they would like to be able to buy their own building. The French Embassy in Senegal contributes to the development of the grounds thanks to former French national team player Moussa Sissoko.
All academy matches are filmed and broadcasted to a viewing platform which allows recruiters from around the world to watch the players. Within the academy, one person is in charge of recruitment: Doudou. He looks for players in Senegal but also in surrounding countries. For some players, it feels almost vital to become a footballer, or at least to make a living from football. Many of them come from very poor families who struggle to make ends meet. The minimum wage in Senegal is €120, and a professional player in the Senegalese league earns on average €150 to €200 per month.
The academy of course trains young footballers, but it also has a social role: the academy wants to train the men. Ultimately, the goal is also to educate the youth through school and football in order to help Senegalese society progress.
Therefore, the academy is very demanding for the kids. If you aren’t doing well in school, or if you have bad behavior, you are expelled. One year, the academy expelled 19 students at once because they had not respected the rules of collective life; no matter how good you are at football, behavior and school come first
Saint-Louis
Here, we met three fishermen. All of them had tried to reach Spain from Saint-Louis by canoes. They told us about the treacherous journey they lived through: an overcrowded boat where they left with 93 people and only 34 survived. They were not allowed to stay in Spain so the government sent them back to Senegal. The fishermen told us that there were no more fish here because the Senegalese government sold the waters to Chinese naval trawlers. To find fish, they now go into waters off the coast of Mauritania. A 62-year-old fisherman reminisced about the time when the French were in Saint-Louis: free medicine, efficient hospitals, jobs. Since then, life has been hard here: “What kills Africa is Africans, ” he claimed.
The streets of Saint-Louis are suffocating. According to the fishermen, on the Langue de Barbarie alone, there are around 33,000 inhabitants. It’s completely packed with countless children outside. Between fishing, the heat, animals (horses, sheep) and the smell of highly-polluted exhaust fumes, the mix of odors can be overwhelming!
In the late afternoon, when it was less hot, we passed by the beach. After visiting around thirty countries around the world, we had never seen anything like this. The shore had turned into an open-air landfill and the sand was no longer visible with all the trash on the ground. Still, that didn't stop young people from playing football, and they were playing for kilometers down thebeach. The amount of footballers was only comparable to Rio de Janeiro’s shores! Everywhere, all of the men were wearing football jerseys, and me, with my long hair, people thought I was Haaland!
As we kept walking, we passed by a high school where we were invited inside an all girls’ classroom by a math teacher. They were studying to take the baccalaureate exam in about a month. True to the spirit of Teraanga hospitality, the teacher gave money to two young girls who went and bought us refreshments.
In Saint-Louis, we also met a former top professional player and top scorer in the Senegalese league. He played in China, Syria, and Bangladesh. “Bangladesh is the strangest country I’ve been to. I went to China when I was 22; I was a bit scared at first—Shenzhen. Luckily there were foreigners there, including some Africans. ”
If I had to choose a country where football is the most embedded in people’s lives, Senegal is the one.