Hugo Ekitike (born 20 June 2002) is a French 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

striker Striker or The Strikers may refer to: People *A participant in a strike action *A participant in a hunger strike *Blacksmith's striker, a type of blacksmith's assistant *Striker's Independent Society, the oldest mystic krewe in America People wi ...

for

Ligue 1 Ligue 1, officially known as Ligue 1 Uber Eats for sponsorship reasons, is a French professional league for men's association football clubs. At the top of the French football league system, it is the country's primary football competition. A ...

club Paris Saint-Germain.

Early life

Hugo Ekitike was born on 20 June 2002 in

Reims Reims ( , , ; also spelled Rheims in English) is the most populous city in the French department of Marne, and the 12th most populous city in France. The city lies northeast of Paris on the Vesle river, a tributary of the Aisne. Founded by ...

, Marne to a French father and a Cameroonian mother.

Club career

Reims

On 12 July 2020, Ekitike signed his first professional contract with

. He debuted with the senior team in a 3–1

loss to Lorient on 17 October 2020. On 29 January 2021, Ekitike joined

Danish Superliga The Danish Superliga ( da, Superligaen, ) is the current Danish football championship tournament, and administered by the Danish Football Association. It is the highest football league in Denmark and is currently contested by 12 teams each yea ...

club Vejle Boldklub on

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 ...

for the rest of the season. On 26 September 2021, Ekitike scored Reims' second and third goals in a 3–1 win against

Nantes Nantes (, , ; Gallo: or ; ) is a city in Loire-Atlantique on the Loire, from the Atlantic coast. The city is the sixth largest in France, with a population of 314,138 in Nantes proper and a metropolitan area of nearly 1 million inhabita ...

, having come on as a substitute. In the January 2022 transfer window, Ekitike rejected a potential transfer to

Newcastle United Newcastle United Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Newcastle upon Tyne, that plays in the Premier League – the top flight of English football. The club was founded in 1892 by the merger of Newcastle East End ...

. Reims president Jean-Pierre Caillot admitted that the club had received "very good offers" for Ekitike, but reiterated that "there is still a piece of history to write together".

Paris Saint-Germain

On 16 July 2022, Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) announced the signing of Ekitike on a season-long loan with an option-to-buy for a reported fee of €35 million, bonuses included. According to several sources, the purchase option in the deal was made mandatory. Ekitike made his PSG debut as a substitute in a 5–0 league win away to Clermont on 6 August 2022. On 1 October, he made his first start for the club in a 2–1 league victory over

Nice Nice ( , ; Niçard: , classical norm, or , nonstandard, ; it, Nizza ; lij, Nissa; grc, Νίκαια; la, Nicaea) is the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes department in France. The Nice agglomeration extends far beyond the administrative c ...

at the

Parc des Princes Parc des Princes () is an all-seater stadium, all-seater Association football, football stadium in Paris, France, in the south-west of the French capital, inside the 16th arrondissement of Paris, 16th arrondissement, near the Stade Jean-Bouin ...

. Ten days later, Ekitike made his

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competit ...

debut, coming on as a late-match substitute in a 1–1 home draw against Benfica. On 13 November, he scored his first goal for Paris Saint-Germain in a 5–0 home win over Auxerre. He finished the season with four goals and four assists in thirty-two matches, winning his first Ligue 1 title. In June 2023, his transfer to PSG became a permanent deal worth €28.5m plus €6.5m in bonuses. In September 2023, it was reported that he was excluded from the Champions League squad for the 2023–24 season.

International career

Ekitike was eligible to play for France because of his birth and through his father and for Cameroon through his mother. He is a youth international for France, having represented the France U20s.

Career statistics

Honours

Paris Saint-Germain *

2022–23 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

References

External links

Profile
at the Paris Saint-Germain F.C. website * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ekitike, Hugo 2002 births Living people Footballers from Reims French men's footballers Cameroonian men's footballers Men's association football forwards Stade de Reims players Vejle Boldklub players Paris Saint-Germain F.C. players Championnat National 2 players Ligue 1 players Danish Superliga players France men's youth international footballers French expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Denmark French expatriate sportspeople in Denmark Black French sportspeople French sportspeople of Cameroonian descent