Hamza Bencherif ( ar, حمزة بن شريف; born 9 February 1988) 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 le ...

who plays as a defender or

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

Northern Premier League The Northern Premier League is an English football league that was founded in 1968. It has four divisions: the Premier Division (which stands at level 7 of the English football league system), Division One East, Division One West and Divisio ...

club

Worksop Town Worksop Town Football Club is an English football club based in Worksop, Nottinghamshire. As of the 2021–22 season the team plays in the . They are nicknamed ''The Tigers'' and play their home games at Sandy Lane in Worksop. History First clu ...

where he is club captain. Born in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

, he has played in

the Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, the league is the oldest such competition in the world. It was the top-level football league in Engla ...

for several clubs and represented Algeria at youth international level.

Club career

Bencherif was born in

and started his career with

Guingamp Guingamp (; ) is a commune in the Côtes-d'Armor department in Brittany in northwestern France. With a population of 6,895 as of 2017, Guingamp is one of the smallest towns in Europe to have a top-tier professional football team: En Avant Guinga ...

before joining

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 ...

youth system In sporting terminology, a youth system (or youth academy) is a youth investment program within a particular team or league, which develops and nurtures young talent in farm teams, with the vision of using them in the first team in the future if ...

in August 2006. He joined

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 ...

club Lincoln City on 2 October 2007 on a one-month

loan In finance, a loan is the lending of money by one or more individuals, organizations, or other entities to other individuals, organizations, etc. The recipient (i.e., the borrower) incurs a debt and is usually liable to pay interest on that d ...

, which was extended for a second month. He made 12 appearances and scored 1 goal against

Chesterfield Chesterfield may refer to: Places Canada * Rural Municipality of Chesterfield No. 261, Saskatchewan * Chesterfield Inlet, Nunavut United Kingdom * Chesterfield, Derbyshire, a market town in England ** Chesterfield (UK Parliament constitue ...

. He was released by Forest at the end of the 2008–09 season and signed a one-year contract with League Two club

Macclesfield Town Macclesfield Town Football Club was an English professional association football, football club based in Macclesfield, Cheshire, that was liquidation, wound-up after a High Court of Justice, High Court ruling on 16 September 2020. Initially kno ...

on 6 July 2009. He became a first-team regular in the first half of the season at

Moss Rose Moss Rose, known as The Leasing.com Stadium for sponsorship reasons, is a football stadium in Macclesfield, Cheshire, England, which is the home ground of Macclesfield F.C., and the former home of Macclesfield Town F.C., Macclesfield Town, a clu ...

, but a broken ankle he sustained in December 2009 ended his season. Bencherif signed a one-year extension to his contract in May 2010, and scored 11 goals in 46 appearances in 2010–11. He rejected a new contract offer from Macclesfield to sign a two-year contract with

League One The English Football League One (often referred to as League One for short or Sky Bet League One for sponsorship purposes, and known as the Football League One from 2004 until 2016) is the second-highest division of the English Football Leag ...

club

Notts County Notts County Football Club is a professional association football club based in Nottingham, England. The team participate in the National League (division), National League, the fifth tier of the English football league system. Founded on the 2 ...

on 23 June 2011. He was released when his contract expired in the summer of 2013. Bencherif signed a short-term contract with League Two club

Plymouth Argyle Plymouth Argyle Football Club is a professional football club based in the city of Plymouth, Devon, England. As of the 2021–22 season, the team are competing in League One, the third tier of English football. They have played at Home Park, ...

in September 2013, and scored on his debut the next day against

Cheltenham Town Cheltenham Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in the town of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England. From the 2021–22 season, the club compete in League One, the third tier of the English football league syst ...

. He was released in January 2014, having made nine appearances for the club, before signing for

Algerian Ligue Professionnelle 1 The Algerian Ligue Professionnelle 1 ( ar, الرابطة الجزائرية المحترفة الأولى لكرة القدم); known as Championnat National de Première Division or Ligue 1 for short, and formerly known as the Championnat Natio ...

club

JS Kabylie Jeunesse Sportive de Kabylie (in ar, شبيبة القبائل), (Kabyle language, Kabyle: Ilemẓiyen inaddalen n leqbayel, Berber languages, In Tamazight: ⵉⵍⵎⵣⵢⵏ ⵉⵏⴰⴷⴰⵍⴻⵏ ⵏ ⵍⵇⵠⴰⵢⵍ), known as JS Kabyli ...

on a one-and-a-half-year contract. Bencherif joined

Conference Premier The National League, known as the Vanarama National League for sponsorship reasons, is the highest level of the National League System and fifth-highest of the overall English football league system. It is the highest league that is semi-profess ...

club Lincoln City on 1 August 2014 on a one-year contract. After one season with Lincoln, he turned down a new contract to join

National League The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the National League (NL), is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, and the world's oldest extant professional team s ...

club

F.C. Halifax Town FC Halifax Town is a professional association football club based in Halifax, West Yorkshire, England. They currently compete in and play at the Shay. They replaced Halifax Town A.F.C., which went into administration in the 2007–08 season. ...

. He started as F.C. Halifax beat

Grimsby Town Grimsby Town Football Club is a professional football club based in Cleethorpes, North East Lincolnshire, England, that in the 2022–23 season will compete in , the fourth tier of the English football league system, following the victory in ...

1–0 on 22 May 2016 at

Wembley Stadium Wembley Stadium (branded as Wembley Stadium connected by EE for sponsorship reasons) is a football stadium in Wembley, London. It opened in 2007 on the site of the Wembley Stadium (1923), original Wembley Stadium, which was demolished from 200 ...

in the

2016 FA Trophy Final The 2015–16 FA Trophy Final was the 47th final of the FA Trophy. The match was contested by FC Halifax Town and Grimsby Town. Grimsby Town were beaten finalists in 2013, but it was FC Halifax Town's first final and their first visit to Wembley ...

. Bencherif signed for National League club

Wrexham Wrexham ( ; cy, Wrecsam; ) is a city and the administrative centre of Wrexham County Borough in Wales. It is located between the Welsh mountains and the lower Dee Valley, near the border with Cheshire in England. Historically in the count ...

on 24 May 2016 on a one-year contract. On 17 January 2017, Bencherif joined Wrexham's National League rivals

York City York City Football Club is a professional association football club based in the city of York, North Yorkshire, England. As of the 2022–23 season, the team compete in the National League, at the fifth tier of the English football league sys ...

on loan until the end of 2016–17. On 21 May 2017, he started as York beat Macclesfield Town 3–2 at Wembley Stadium in the

2017 FA Trophy Final The 2016–17 FA Trophy Final was the 48th final of the Football Association's cup competition for teams at levels 5–8 of the English football league system. The match was contested between Macclesfield Town and York City. The final of the FA ...

. Bencherif signed for York permanently on 16 June 2017 on a one-year contract. He was released at the end of the 2018–19 season. Bencherif signed for

National League North The National League North, formerly Conference North, is a division of the National League in England, immediately below the National League division. Along with the National League South, it is at the second level of the National League Sy ...

club

Guiseley Guiseley ( ) is a town in metropolitan borough of the City of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. Historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, it is situated south of Otley and Menston and is now a north-western suburb of Leeds. It sits in t ...

on 24 June 2019. On 9 January 2021 he was appointed Club Captain. On 9 June 2022, Bencherif signed for

club

International career

Bencherif made seven appearances, scoring one goal, for the Algeria national under-20 team from 2005 to 2006. A call-up to the senior team was talked about in 2009 due to his form at Macclesfield Town before a broken ankle ended his season.

Career statistics

Honours

F.C. Halifax Town *

FA Trophy The Football Association Challenge Trophy, commonly known as the FA Trophy, is a men's football knockout cup competition run by and named after the English Football Association and competed for primarily by semi-professional teams. The compet ...

: 2015–16 York City *FA Trophy: 2016–17

References

External links

Profile
at the Guiseley A.F.C. website {{DEFAULTSORT:Bencherif, Hamza 1988 births Living people Footballers from Paris Algerian men's footballers Algeria men's youth international footballers French men's footballers Men's association football defenders Men's association football midfielders En Avant Guingamp players Nottingham Forest F.C. players Lincoln City F.C. players Macclesfield Town F.C. players Notts County F.C. players Plymouth Argyle F.C. players JS Kabylie players FC Halifax Town players Wrexham A.F.C. players York City F.C. players Guiseley A.F.C. players English Football League players Algerian Ligue Professionnelle 1 players National League (English football) players Algerian expatriate men's footballers French expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in England Algerian expatriate sportspeople in England French expatriate sportspeople in England French sportspeople of Algerian descent