Who the hell is Youssef Msakni?

If you follow Brighton and Hove Albion on Facebook, then you’ll have noticed that every single post over the past fortnight has been hijacked by people asking where Youssef Msakni is.

We’re used to this of course – there have been hundreds of fantastic comments emanating from South Africa asking where Percy Tau is despite the fact that the striker cannot qualify for a British work permit yet, and as a result will be spending the foreseeable future out on loan around Europe.

When it comes to Msakni, it seems that the entire population of Tunisia has liked the Albion just to ask the question of when he is signing for us. Someone has even changed his Wikipedia page to say he has already signed for Brighton.

With a whole nation seemingly convinced that the player they hilariously believe to be the greatest in the world is set to land at the Amex this January, it begs the question – who the hell is Youssef Msakni and would he actually be a decent signing for the Albion?

The answer, predictably, is probably not. Msakni plays mainly as a left winger, but can also operate as a number 10 or second striker. He has represented his country 47 times, scoring nine goals but missed out on playing at the World Cup due to injury, otherwise he could have lined up against England in their opening game of the tournament and joined his team mates in trying to kick Harry Kane and co off the pitch.

Despite our new-found Tunisian supporters proclaiming him to be better than Mo Salah and a player who will lead the Albion to the Champions League, his club career reads four season in the notoriously tough Tunisian Ligue Professionnelle 1 and another four in the footballing powerhouse that is the Qatar Stars League.

Msakni began his career in his home country with ES Tunis, playing 132 times and scoring 46 goals. He lifted four Tunisian titles and one African Champions League – also won by Tau during his time at Mamelodi Sundowns – before his talents were noticed not by the giants of Real Madrid, Barcelona or Manchester United, but Lekhwiya SC.

The Qatari top flight side paid around €11.5m for his services in January 2013 and they’ve been rewarded with four league championships, two Qatar Emir Cups, three Qatar Crown Prince Cups and two Shiekh Jassem Cups. He has scored 69 times in 103 games for the side who renamed themselves Al Duhail in 2017 at a standard that is presumably around the same as a pub league, except that you couldn’t actually get pissed in public the night before a game.

Given that Chris Hughton has Solly March, Anthony Knockaert, Jose Izquierdo, Alireza Jahanbakhsh and now Jurgen Locadia vying for two sports out wide, it seems unlikely that we would need a sixth winger to join the battle.

The fact that Msakni has played in two extremely weak leagues means that his signing would be a huge gamble. Given that we’ve yet to see anything from Jahanbakhsh, who fits a similar profile in terms of nationality, career path and mental fans from his home country, it is difficult to see why the Albion would take another risk on an untried foreign player.

That won’t go down well with the Tunisian’s on Facebook, many of whom who have already taken to posting “F**k Brighton” in response to the club not yet signing their hero. They will probably be sorely disappointed as he’s; A) Not very good, and B) Not needed by the Albion.

Angry foreign supporters bombarding the clubs Facebook page with comments about an average player – it’s the price of being a Premier League club, we suppose.