Moussa Dembélé (French footballer)

Moussa Dembélé

Dembélé playing for Celtic in 2017
Personal information
Full name Moussa Dembélé[1]
Date of birth (1996-07-12) 12 July 1996[2]
Place of birth Pontoise, France
Height 1.83 m (6 ft 0 in)[2]
Playing position Striker
Club information
Current team
 Celtic
Number 10
Youth career
2002–2004 US Cergy Clos
2004–2012 Paris Saint-Germain
2012–2013 Fulham
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
2013–2016 Fulham 56 (15)
2016– Celtic 29 (17)
National team‡
2011–2012 France U16 14 (4)
2013 France U17 3 (0)
2013–2014 France U18 3 (1)
2014–2015 France U19 10 (5)
2015–2016 France U20 4 (0)
2016– France U21 6 (4)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 08:50, 17 April 2017 (UTC).
‡ National team caps and goals correct as of 14:03, 10 June 2017 (UTC)

Moussa Dembélé (born 12 July 1996) is a French professional footballer who plays as a striker for Scottish Premiership club Celtic.

Developed at Paris Saint-Germain and English team Fulham, he made his professional debut for the latter in the Premier League in November 2013, and totalled 19 goals in 64 competitive games for them before joining Celtic in 2016.

He has earned over 30 caps for France at youth level, and in October 2016 stepped up to the under-21 team.

Early life and family

Dembélé was born in Pontoise, Île-de-France.[3] His family is Malian.[4]

Club career

Fulham

Dembélé playing for Fulham in 2016

Dembélé signed for Fulham aged sixteen, from Paris Saint-Germain, in 2012.[5] He subsequently became a regular in the Fulham U18 team and won the Premier Academy League in his first season with the club.[6] He signed his first contract with Fulham in July 2013 until the summer of 2015.[6]

Dembélé was an unused substitute for the Premier League match against Swansea City on 23 November 2013.[7] He made his competitive debut a week later against West Ham United, coming on as a substitute in the 83rd minute for Kieran Richardson in a 3–0 loss at the Boleyn Ground,[8] but finished the game with an injury.[9] On 30 March 2014, he started for the first time in the Premier League, as Fulham lost 3–1 at home to Everton.[10] The club ended the season with relegation to the Championship.

On 28 October 2014, in the fourth round of the League Cup, Dembélé scored his first professional goals, a brace which put Fulham 2–0 up at home against Derby County; however, the match ended in a 2–5 defeat.[11]

Dembélé scored his first league goal for Fulham in a 2–1 win against Blackburn Rovers on 13 September 2015, and scored a brace in a 4–2 win against Reading on 24 October as Fulham overcame a 0–2 deficit to win 4–2.[12] Dembélé scored twice again in the following match a week later as Fulham beat Bristol City 4–1 at Ashton Gate.[13] By the end of the calendar year, he had totalled ten goals for the season.[14]

Celtic

On 28 June 2016, Scottish Premiership club Celtic signed Dembélé on a four-year contract.[15] He made his debut on 12 July, his 20th birthday, partnering Leigh Griffiths up front in a 1–0 loss at Gibraltar's Lincoln Red Imps in the first leg of the second qualifying round of the season's UEFA Champions League.[16]

On 3 August, Dembélé scored his first goal for the club with a 92nd-minute penalty against Astana—after having won the penalty himself—to put Celtic into the Champions League play-offs.[17] He followed this up by netting twice against Motherwell in the Scottish League Cup last 16 on 10 August, as Celtic ran out 5–0 winners.[18] He also scored the fourth goal in a 5–2 win over Hapoel Be'er Sheva the following week.[19]

On 10 September, as his club beat Rangers 5–1 at Parkhead, he scored Celtic's first Old Firm derby league hat-trick since Stevie Chalmers in 1966,[20] and the first Celtic player to score a hat-trick in any game against Rangers since Harry Hood in 1973.[21] It was also considered to be a "perfect hat-trick", given his goals were scored with his head, his right foot and finally with his left foot.[22] On 24 September, Dembélé scored twice in a 6–1 win over Kilmarnock,[23] then four days later he scored his first two Champions League group stage goals against Manchester City, as Celtic finished the match with a 3–3 draw.[24] His goalscoring form at that time saw him named the Premiership player of the month for September.[25]

Dembélé scored a late winner in a 1–0 victory over Rangers on 23 October, sending Celtic to the League Cup final,[26] and scored again in the final against Aberdeen, netting from the penalty spot as Celtic won 3–0 for his first senior honour.[27]

Dembélé was linked with a move to Chelsea during the January 2017 transfer window;[28] coincidentally, he was sent to a hospital in Chelsea for medical treatment on 31 January, the final day of the transfer window.[28] Later that day, however, he confirmed he was staying by tweeting a picture of himself celebrating a goal above an image of Leonardo DiCaprio's character, Jordan Belfort, from the film The Wolf of Wall Street.[29]

He scored back-to-back hat-tricks in February 2017, in 5–2[30] and 6–0[31] victories over St Johnstone in the Scottish Premiership and Inverness Caledonian Thistle in the Scottish Cup, respectively.

International career

Dembélé was part of the France under-19 squad which reached the semi-finals of the 2015 European Championship, scoring in group stage victories over Ukraine and the hosts, Greece.[32] He made his debut for the under-21 team in October 2016, coming on as a second-half substitute and scoring one of France's goals in a 5–1 win over Georgia.[33]

Career statistics

Dembélé playing for Celtic in 2017
As of match played 2 August 2017
Appearances and goals by club, season and competition
Club Season League National Cup League Cup Europe Total
DivisionAppsGoalsAppsGoalsAppsGoalsAppsGoalsAppsGoals
Fulham 2013–14[34] Premier League 201000—30
2014–15[35] Championship 1103012—152
2015–16[36] Championship 43151121—4617
Total 56155133—6419
Celtic 2016–17[37] Scottish Premiership 2917454512[lower-alpha 1]54932
2017–18[38] Scottish Premiership 0000002[lower-alpha 1]020
Total 291745451455132
Career total 8532967814511551
  1. 1 2 Appearances in UEFA Champions League

Honours

Club

Celtic

Individual

References

  1. ↑ "Moussa Dembele". Barry Hugman's Footballers. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
  2. 1 2 "Moussa Dembele profile". Fulham F.C. 30 November 2013. Archived from the original on 10 December 2013. Retrieved 30 November 2013.
  3. ↑ "Info FM : Moussa Dembélé, l’ancien espoir du PSG qui cartonne à Fulham". Foot Mercato (in French). 15 November 2015. Retrieved 10 September 2016.
  4. ↑ "Moussa Dembélé séduit Zidane". Footmali (in French). 6 July 2016. Retrieved 10 September 2016.
  5. ↑ "Fulham sign Moussa Dembele to possibly replace Moussa Dembele". Metro. DMG Media. 3 August 2012. Retrieved 30 November 2013.
  6. 1 2 "Through The Ranks: Moussa Dembele". Fulham FC. 23 May 2013. Archived from the original on 3 December 2013. Retrieved 30 November 2013.
  7. ↑ "Fulham 1–2 Swansea City". BBC Sport. 23 November 2013. Retrieved 30 November 2013.
  8. ↑ "West Ham 3–0 Fulham". BBC Sport. 30 November 2013. Retrieved 30 November 2013.
  9. ↑ "Dembélé's Debut". Fulham FC. 3 December 2013. Retrieved 4 December 2013.
  10. ↑ "Fulham 1–3 Everton". BBC Sport. 30 March 2014. Retrieved 1 April 2014.
  11. ↑ "Fulham 2–5 Derby". BBC Sport. 28 October 2014. Retrieved 3 November 2014.
  12. ↑ "Fulham 4–2 Reading". BBC Sport. 24 October 2015. Retrieved 24 October 2015.
  13. ↑ "Bristol City 1–4 Fulham". BBC Sport. 31 October 2015.
  14. ↑ Hafez, Shamoon (29 December 2015). "January transfer window: Vardy, Cole, Aubameyang, Robben". BBC Sport. Retrieved 30 December 2015.
  15. ↑ "Celtic delighted to sign Moussa Dembele on a four-year deal". Celtic F.C. 28 June 2016. Retrieved 28 June 2016.
  16. ↑ Donohoe, Eamonn (12 July 2016). "Lincoln Red Imps FC 1–0 Celtic". BBC Sport. Retrieved 18 July 2016.
  17. ↑ "Brendan Rodgers: Celtic fans 'put players on edge' against Astana". BBC Sport. 3 August 2016. Retrieved 3 August 2016.
  18. ↑ Swales, Andy (10 August 2016). "Celtic 5 – 0 Motherwell – Match Report & Highlights". Sky Sports. Retrieved 19 August 2016.
  19. ↑ Esplin, Ronnie (17 August 2016). "Celtic vs Hapoel Be'er Sheva match report: Brendan Rodgers' side take step closer to Champions League group stage". The Independent. Retrieved 19 August 2016.
  20. ↑ English, Tom (10 September 2016). "Scottish Premiership: Celtic 5–1 Rangers". BBC Sport. Retrieved 10 September 2016.
  21. ↑ Herron, Lindsay (13 September 2016). "Harry Hood: I spent five hours in hospital, missed the game and came out to discover my Old Firm hat-trick record had gone". Herald Scotland. Retrieved 13 September 2016.
  22. ↑ Forsyth, Roddy (10 September 2016). "Celtic 5 Rangers 1: Moussa Dembele hits hat-trick in Old Firm thrashing". The Telegraph. Retrieved 28 February 2017.
  23. ↑ English, Tom (24 September 2016). "Celtic 6 - 1 Kimarnock". BBC Sport. Retrieved 28 February 2017.
  24. ↑ English, Tom (28 September 2016). "Champions League: Celtic 3–3 Manchester City". BBC Sport. Retrieved 28 September 2016.
  25. ↑ MacRae, Chris (13 October 2016). "Celtic's Moussa Dembele takes Premiership player of the month award for September". Sky Sports. Retrieved 28 February 2017.
  26. ↑ English, Tom (23 October 2016). "Rangers 0–1 Celtic". BBC Sport. Retrieved 23 October 2016.
  27. ↑ McGowan, Stephen (27 November 2016). "Aberdeen 0-3 Celtic: Tomas Rogic, James Forrest and Moussa Dembele hand Brendan Rodgers first trophy as Hoops boss with Betfred Cup win". Mail Online. DMG Media. Retrieved 1 December 2016.
  28. 1 2 "Celtic explain Dembele's London trip amid Chelsea link". BBC Sport. 2 February 2017. Retrieved 3 February 2017.
  29. ↑ Davis, Callum (1 February 2017). "Chelsea target Moussa Dembele pledges his future to Celtic with Wolf of Wall Street tweet". The Telegraph. Retrieved 7 February 2017.
  30. ↑ "St Johnstone 2–5 Celtic". BBC Sport. 5 February 2017. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
  31. ↑ Cameron, Neil (12 February 2017). "Celtic 6, Inverness Caledonian Thistle 0: A second Moussa Dembele hat-trick in six days bring the Treble even closer". Herald Scotland. Newsquest. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
  32. ↑ Haslam, Andrew (12 July 2015). "France beat Greece to first place in Group A". UEFA. Retrieved 29 July 2015.
  33. ↑ Wilson, Fraser (6 October 2016). "Watch Celtic ace Moussa Dembele score on his debut for France Under 21s as Hoops striker's stock rises further". Daily Record. Retrieved 8 October 2016.
  34. ↑ "Games played by Moussa Dembele in 2013/2014". Soccerbase. Centurycomm. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
  35. ↑ "Games played by Moussa Dembele in 2014/2015". Soccerbase. Centurycomm. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
  36. ↑ "Games played by Moussa Dembele in 2015/2016". Soccerbase. Centurycomm. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
  37. ↑ "Games played by Moussa Dembele in 2016/2017". Soccerbase. Centurycomm. Retrieved 2 August 2017.
  38. ↑ "Games played by Moussa Dembele in 2017/2018". Soccerbase. Centurycomm. Retrieved 2 August 2017.
  39. ↑ "M. Dembélé". Soccerway. Perform Group. Retrieved 14 February 2017.
  40. ↑ "SPFL Awards". SPFL. Retrieved 6 February 2017.
  41. ↑ "PFA SCOTLAND TEAMS OF THE YEAR 2017". PFA Scotland. Retrieved 22 May 2017.
  42. ↑ "Celtic striker Moussa Dembele crowned French Under-21 Player of the Year". Daily Record. Trinity Mirror. 17 December 2016. Retrieved 22 January 2017.
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