Brighton complete signing of Alexis Mac Allister for £7m
Brighton and Hove Albion have made their first – and probably only – signing of the January transfer window with the capture of Alexis Mac Allister for £7m.
The midfielder has penned a four-year contract and arrives from Argentine Primera División club Argentinos Juniors, where he will stay for the remainder of the season after the Albion agreed to loan him back to El Bicho (which rather brilliantly translates to The Bug).
He came through the youth ranks at Agentinos, a journey that many famous Argentinian players have made; the greatest of them all being a certain Diego Maradona after whom their 26,000 capacity stadium in Buenos Aires is named.
Mac Allister made his senior debut in October 2016 when El Semillero del Mundo (which rather brilliantly translates as World’s Seedbed) were in the Argentina’s second tier. He helped them to the Primera B Nacional title in his first season, scoring three times in 24 games and has registered five more goals in 33 top flight appearances over the past one-and-a-half seasons.
Capable of playing as an attacking midfielder, a number 10 or a second striker, Mac Allister is considered one of the hottest young talents in Argentina and was called up to Argentina’s Under 20 squad in 2017.
He also has a reputation as something of a set piece expert and is known for his prodigious work rate. Essentially, he sounds like a younger, Latin version of Pascal Gross.
Mac Allister comes from a talented footballing family. His father Carlos was a left back who played for Argentinos and then Boca Juniors and won three caps for Argentina in 1993 while Alexis’ two brothers Francis and Kevin also played alongside him for El Tifón de Boyacá (which rather brilliantly translates as Boyacá’s Typhoon).
Kevin had been due to join Alexis at Brighton, but accidentally ended up in New York instead where he checked into The Plaza Hotel and received directions from Donald Trump.
The Albion will hope Mac Allister’s signing works out better than their last three arrivals directly from Argentina. Cristian Baz and Agustín Battipiedi arrived amid much fanfare in 2011 but their combined highlights were restricted to Baz scooping the winning penalty in an FA Cup first round shoot out against Woking straight down the middle.
Before those two, Federico Turienzo was decreed not good enough by Mark McGhee after a poor showing in a trial game against Lewes. Undeterred by his manager’s opinion, Dick Knight went and paid £150,000 for the strikers services anyway with Turienzo managing just four appearances and no goals, going down as one of the most extraordinary purchases in the club’s history.
The last Argentinian to play for Brighton was Leonardo Ulloa, although he arrived on a Spanish passport having made his name in Spain with Castellón and then Almería.
Ulloa became a real fan favourite at the Amex and if Mac Allister can go onto achieve as much in an Albion shirt as he did, then it will be £7m well spent.
