Aaron Tshibola (born 2 January 1995) is a professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby ...

who plays as a

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

for Hatta. Born in London, he came through the youth ranks at

Reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of letters, symbols, etc., especially by sight or touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process involving such areas as word recognition, orthography (spelling ...

before moving to Aston Villa in 2016. He represented England at U18 level in 2013 but has since been called up by DR Congo and played in a friendly match for the side in March 2018. He has had loan spells at English Football League sides

Hartlepool United Hartlepool United Football Club is a professional association football club based in Hartlepool, County Durham, England. The team competes in EFL League Two, League Two, the fourth tier of the English football league system. They were founded i ...

Nottingham Forest Nottingham Forest Football Club is an association football club based in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, England. Nottingham Forest was founded in 1865 and have been playing their home games at the City Ground, on the banks of the River Tren ...

and

Milton Keynes Dons Milton Keynes Dons Football Club (), usually abbreviated to MK Dons, is a professional association football club based in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. The team competes in , the third tier of the English football league system. The ...

, as well as

Scottish Premiership The Scottish Premiership, known as the cinch Premiership for sponsorship reasons, is the top division of the Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL), the league competition for men's professional football clubs in Scotland. The Scottis ...

side Kilmarnock. He has also played in Belgium for Waasland Beveren and in Portugal for Aves.

Early life

Tshibola was born in the London Borough of Newham in England.

Club career

Reading

Tshibola joined

's academy at age thirteen and signed his first professional deal with the club in March 2011. While in the Reading Academy, Tshibola went on trial with Manchester United. Ahead of the 2014–15 season, Tshibola signed a new contract with

, keeping him at the club until 2016. Then on 23 August 2014, he made his professional debut as an 86th-minute substitute in a

Championship In sport, a championship is a competition in which the aim is to decide which individual or team is the champion. Championship systems Various forms of competition can be referred to by the term championship. Title match system In this system ...

fixture against

. On 9 September 2015, Tshibola extended his contract with Reading until the summer of 2019. On 2 January 2015, he moved to

League Two The English Football League Two (often referred to as League Two for short or Sky Bet League Two for sponsorship purposes, and known as the Football League Two from 2004 until 2016) is the third and lowest division of the English Football Lea ...

side

on a one-month loan deal, before making his debut the next day in a 1–0 loss against

Wycombe Wanderers Wycombe Wanderers Football Club is an English professional association football club based in the town of High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire. The team compete in League One, the third tier of the English football league system. They play their ho ...

. His first four appearances at the club earned Tshibola a loan extension until the end of the season. His loan spell extension led manager

Ronnie Moore Ronald David Moore (born 29 January 1953) is an English football manager and former player. He has taken charge of several clubs including Rotherham United, Tranmere Rovers and Hartlepool United. He played for many different clubs in a care ...

to thank Tshibola for his commitment at Hartlepool United. He was then awarded

Man of the match In team sport, a player of the match or man of the match or woman of the match award is often given to the most outstanding player in a particular match. This can be a player from either team, although the player is generally chosen from the winn ...

, in a 3–2 win over Plymouth Argyle after an impressive performance when he assisted one of the goals in the game.

Aston Villa

On 10 July 2016, Tshibola moved to Aston Villa on a four-year contract, for an undisclosed fee. He scored his first goal for the club in a 1–1 draw with Newcastle United on 24 September 2016. On 30 January 2017, Tshibola moved to

on loan for the remainder of the 2016–17 season. On 27 July 2017, Tshibola joined EFL League One side

on a season-long loan deal. He scored his first goal for MK Dons in an EFL Trophy tie against Brighton & Hove Albion Under-23s on 29 August 2017. On 9 November 2017 he returned to Aston Villa following the mutual termination of his loan with Milton Keynes Dons.

Kilmarnock

Tshibola was loaned to

club Kilmarnock in January 2018, working under his former

manager

Steve Clarke ''yes'Steve is a masculine given name, usually a short form (hypocorism) of Steven or Stephen Notable people with the name include: steve jops * Steve Abbott (disambiguation), several people * Steve Adams (disambiguation), several people * Steve ...

. He made his debut for Killie on 3 February 2018, as a 65th minute substitute for

Kris Boyd Kris Boyd (born 18 August 1983) is a Scottish former professional footballer who played as a forward. Boyd grew up in the South Ayrshire village of Tarbolton and started his senior career with Kilmarnock. He transferred to Rangers in Januar ...

in the Ayrshire side's 1–0 win over

Champions Celtic. Tshibola scored his first Kilmarnock goal in the 4–0

Scottish Cup The Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup,Brora Rangers Brora Rangers Football Club are a Scottish football club from the village of Brora, Sutherland, in the Highland council area of Scotland. They play in the Highland Football League, of which they have been champions four times, having won their ...

the following week. After six months, he returned to Aston Villa, only to be loaned back out to Kilmarnock for another season on 29 August 2018.

Waasland Beveren

On 29 August 2019, Tshibola signed for Belgian club Waasland Beveren for an undisclosed fee. On 19 October 2019, Tshibola made his debut in a 2–0 defeat to

Gent Gent is a shortened form of the word gentleman. It may also refer to: * Ghent (Dutch language, Dutch: Gent), a Belgian city ** K.A.A. Gent, a football club from Ghent ** K.R.C. Gent, a football club from Ghent ** Gent RFC, a rugby club in Ghen ...

Aves

On 31 January 2020, Tshibola signed for Portuguese side Aves on a one-and-a-half year contract. On 1 March 2020, Tshibola made his debut, coming on as substitute in a 3–1 defeat to

F.C. Paços de Ferreira Futebol Clube Paços de Ferreira () is a Portuguese football club based in Paços de Ferreira, Porto district. Founded in 1950, the club competes in the Primeira Liga, holding home games at the 9,077-seater Estádio da Mata Real, a municipal s ...

. He made one other appearance in a 2–0 defeat to

Sporting CP Sporting Clube de Portugal, founded Sporting Club de Portugal (), otherwise referred to as Sporting CP, often known abroad as Sporting Lisbon , is a Portuguese professional sports club based in Lisbon. It is best known for the professional foot ...

before the league was suspended due to the

COVID-19 pandemic in Portugal The COVID-19 pandemic in Portugal is part of the pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 () caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (). On 2 March 2020, the virus was confirmed to have reached the country when it was report ...

. On 13 July 2020, Tshibola announced on his

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

account that due to financial difficulties at the club, he had left Aves and was a free agent once again.

Kilmarnock

On 31 July 2020, Tshibola returned for a third spell with Kilmarnock, signing a one-year contract. He left Kilmarnock at the end of the 2020–21 season.

Gençlerbirliği

In July 2021, Tshibola signed for Turkish side Gençlerbirliği. He made his debut playing 90 minutes of a 0–0 draw with

Adanaspor Adanaspor is a Turkish professional football club based in Adana, currently performing at the TFF First League. The club is founded in 1954 by the middle-class merchants and artisans in response to the alienation within city's then most popular c ...

. On 19 December 2021, Tshibola scored his first goal in Turkish football, in a 5–0 victory over

Menemenspor Menemenspor, formerly Menemen Belediyespor, is a Turkish professional football club located in the Menemen district of İzmir İzmir ( , ; ), also spelled Izmir, is a metropolitan city in the western extremity of Anatolia, capital of the provi ...

AEL Limassol

On 12 August 2022,

Cypriot First Division The Cypriot First Division ( el, Πρωτάθλημα Α΄ Κατηγορίας) is the top tier football league competition in Cyprus, run by the Cyprus Football Association. Since February 2016, it is sponsored by Cyta and is thus officially ...

club

AEL Limassol Athlitiki Enosi Lemesou ( el, Αθλητική Ένωση Λεμεσού, translation=Athletic Union of Limassol) commonly known as AEL, is a Cypriot sports club based in the city of Limassol, most famous for its football team. AEL also maintai ...

announced that Tshibola had joined the club. He made his debut of the club on 28 August 2022, in a 2–1 away defeat to local rivals

Aris Limassol Aris Limassol (Greek: ''Άρης Λεμεσού'') is a Cypriot football club based in Limassol and one of the founder members of Cyprus Football Association. The club's colours are green, black and white, and their home is the Tsirion Stadiu ...

. He scored his first goal in Cyprus on 28 October 2022, in a 3–0 victory over Akritas Chlorakas.

Hatta Club

In August 2023, Tshibola joined newly promoted

UAE Pro League The UAE Pro League ( ar, دوري المحترفين الإماراتي), known for sponsorship reasons as the ADNOC Pro League, is the top professional football league in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The first team to win the title was Al ...

team

Hatta Club Hatta Club is a sports club based in Hatta in the Emirate of Dubai, UAE, founded in 1981. It is most widely known for its professional football team, which currently plays in the UAE Pro League. Current squad ''As of UAE First Division Le ...

for a €150,000 fee.

International career

Tshibola was called up by England U18 and made his debut, coming on as a substitute in the second half, in a 1–0 loss against

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

on 5 March 2013. He is also eligible to represent

The Democratic Republic of the Congo The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...

due to his ancestry. He was called up to the DR Congo national football team for a friendly against

Kenya ) , national_anthem = " Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu"() , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Nairobi , coordinates = , largest_city = Nairobi ...

on 26 March 2017, but did not make an appearance. On 27 March 2018, he finally made his senior international debut for DR Congo, playing 45 minutes in a friendly against

Tanzania Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands ...

Career statistics

Honours

Reading U21 *

U21 Premier League Cup The Premier League Cup is an English football competition run by the Premier League for under–21 sides. History The competition was created in 2013 as the U21 Premier League Cup, an U21 equivalent of the FA Youth Cup (an U18 competition com ...

: 2013–14 Gençlerbirliği *

TSYD Cup The TSYD Cup ( tr, Türk Spor Yazarları Derneği Kupası, Turkish Sports Writers Association Cup) was a friendly football competition in Turkey. The tournament started in 1963. It was played throughout six regions in Turkey: Adana, Ankara, Istanbu ...

: 2021–22

References

External links