Tahith Jose Girigorio Djorkaef Chong (born 4 December 1999) is a Dutch 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 winger for club

Birmingham City Birmingham City Football Club is a professional association football, football club based in Birmingham, England. Formed in 1875 as Small Heath Alliance, it was renamed Small Heath in 1888, Birmingham in 1905, and Birmingham City in 1943. Sin ...

. Chong joined the Manchester United Academy aged 16, after progressing through the Feyenoord youth system. He won both the

Jimmy Murphy Young Player of the Year Manchester United Football Club Under-21s is the most senior of Manchester United F.C., Manchester United's youth teams and the club's former reserve team. They play in the Premier League 2, the highest tier of the Professional Development Leag ...

and Denzil Haroun Reserve Player of the Year awards at United. He made his professional debut in 2019, in an

FA Cup The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual knockout football competition in men's domestic English football. First played during the 1871–72 season, it is the oldest national football competi ...

game against

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 ...

. In August 2020, he joined

Werder Bremen Sportverein Werder Bremen von 1899 e. V. (), commonly known as Werder Bremen (), Werder or simply Bremen, is a German professional sports club based in Bremen, Free Hanseatic City of Bremen. Founded on 4 February 1899, they are best known for the ...

on a season-long loan, which was cut short in January 2021 to facilitate a loan move to Club Brugge. He spent the 2021–22 season on loan at Birmingham City and then joined the club permanently in September 2022. Chong made more than 40 appearances for the Netherlands national youth teams from under-15 to under-21 level. He is also eligible to represent Curaçao at international level.

Early life

Chong was born in

Willemstad Willemstad ( , ; ; en, William Town, italic=yes) is the capital city of Curaçao, an island in the southern Caribbean Sea that forms a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It was the capital of the Netherlands Antilles pr ...

, Curaçao which was then part of the Netherlands Antilles. He is of African and Chinese descent. He later moved to

Rotterdam Rotterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Rotte'') is the second largest city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is in the province of South Holland, part of the North Sea mouth of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta, via the ''"Ne ...

, Netherlands, in order to pursue a move to a professional club. Upon completing a move to Manchester United, Chong's parents also moved to England.

Club career

Early career

Chong joined the youth ranks of

Eredivisie The Eredivisie (; ''"Honour Division"'' or ''"Premier Division"'') is the highest level of professional football in the Netherlands. The league was founded in 1956, two years after the start of professional football in the Netherlands. It is c ...

club

Feyenoord Feyenoord Rotterdam () is a Dutch professional football club (association football), football club in Rotterdam, which plays in the Eredivisie, the top tier in Dutch football. Founded as Wilhelmina in 1908, the club changed to various names bef ...

aged 10, and had attracted interest from several

Premier League The Premier League (legal name: The Football Association Premier League Limited) is the highest level of the men's English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Fo ...

clubs by the age of 16. In September 2014, Chong took part in the

Manchester Premier Cup The Manchester Premier Cup (also known as the Frank Hannah Manchester Premier Cup) is an annual English football knockout tournament involving teams from Greater Manchester, England. It is a County Cup competition of the Manchester Football ...

at the Carrington Training Ground, where he was spotted by Manchester United scouts. In early 2016, Chong was on the verge of joining

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

Manchester United

Youth

In April 2016, Chong announced that he was to join Manchester United after Feyenoord failed to "make a plan" for him. The transfer was made official three months later upon receiving international clearance. Initially linking up with the Under-18s, Chong scored his club's only goal of their 2016–17 FA Youth Cup campaign as they suffered a third round exit to

Southampton Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...

. The following month, he was ruled out for the remainder of the season after suffering a

cruciate ligament Cruciate ligaments (also cruciform ligaments) are pairs of ligaments arranged like a letter X. They occur in several joints of the body, such as the knee joint and the atlanto-axial joint. In a fashion similar to the cords in a toy Jacob's la ...

injury. Making his return 10 months later for the Under-23s, Chong went on to be named the Jimmy Murphy Young Player of the Year in May 2018.

Senior

In July 2018, Chong was called up to the first team for their pre-season tour in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. In their opening game, he featured as a second-half substitute in a 1–1 draw against Club América, followed by starting in their goalless draw against the San Jose Earthquakes. On 23 October, he was named as an unused substitute for the first time in United's 1–0 defeat to Juventus in the Champions League. Following the appointment of

Ole Gunnar Solskjær Ole Gunnar Solskjær (; born 26 February 1973) is a Norwegian professional football manager and former player who played as a forward who last managed Premier League club Manchester United. As a player, Solskjær spent the majority of his car ...

as caretaker manager, Chong made his competitive debut replacing

Juan Mata Juan Manuel Mata García (born 28 April 1988) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays as a midfielder for Turkish Süper Lig club Galatasaray. He mostly plays as a central attacking midfielder, but he can also play on the wing. A gr ...

in a 2–0

victory against

on 5 January. At the end of the season, he was named the Denzil Haroun Reserve Player of the Year award, becaming the first player since

Giuseppe Rossi Giuseppe Rossi (; born 1 February 1987) is a professional footballer who plays as a forward. Born in the United States, Rossi spent most of his career in Europe with Villarreal and Fiorentina, in addition to spells with other clubs in England, I ...

to win the award the year after being named the Jimmy Murphy Young Player of the Year. On 9 March 2020, Chong signed a new contract to keep him at the club until 2022, with the option to extend a further year.

Werder Bremen and Club Brugge loans

On 16 August 2020, Chong joined

Bundesliga The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany. At the top of the German football league system, the Bundesliga is Germany's primary footba ...

club

on a season-long loan. On 12 September, he scored his first goal in his first competitive match for Werder Bremen against

FC Carl Zeiss Jena FC Carl Zeiss Jena is a German football club based in Jena, Thuringia. Formed in 1903 and initially associated with the Carl Zeiss AG factory, they were one of the strongest clubs in East Germany from the 1960s to the 1980s, winning the DDR-Ober ...

in the

DFB-Pokal The DFB-Pokal ( is a German knockout football cup competition held annually by the German Football Association (DFB). Sixty-four teams participate in the competition, including all clubs from the Bundesliga and the 2. Bundesliga. It is considered ...

. Chong's loan was cut short in January 2021. Chong joined Belgian First Division A club Club Brugge on loan on 30 January, and scored on his debut four days later in a

Belgian Cup The Belgian Cup (french: link=no, Coupe de Belgique; nl, Beker van België []; german: link=no, Belgischer Fußballpokal) is the main Single-elimination tournament, knockout association football, football competition in Belgium, run by the Belgia ...

game against Olsa Brakel.

Birmingham City (loan)

On 9 July 2021, Chong joined

on a season-long loan. However, he spent pre-season ahead of the 2021–22 campaign at his parent club, and joined Birmingham in time for the start of the Championship season. He made his debut for Birmingham in a 1–0 win over

Sheffield United Sheffield United Football Club is a professional football club in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, which compete in the . They are nicknamed "the Blades" due to Sheffield's history of cutlery production. The team have played home games at ...

on 7 August, and two weeks later, he made two assists in a 5–0 win over

Luton Town Luton Town Football Club () is a professional association football club based in the town of Luton, Bedfordshire, England, that competes in the Championship, the second tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1885, it is nicknam ...

. On 2 November 2021, Chong returned to Manchester United for his rehabilitation following surgery on a serious groin injury. He returned to Birmingham in February 2022, and two minutes into his first start after his return, away to

Bristol City Bristol City Football Club is a professional football club based in Bristol, England, which compete in the , the second tier of English football. They have played their home games at Ashton Gate since moving from St John's Lane in 1904. The ...

, he opened the scoring in a 2–1 win; it was his only goal for the club. He lasted another month before a hamstring injury kept him out until the last match of the season.

Birmingham City

On 1 September 2022, Chong signed a four-year contract with

for an undisclosed fee.

International career

Chong played youth international football for the Netherlands at under-15, under-16, under-17, under-19, under-20 and under-21 levels. He represented the under-17 national team at the

2016 UEFA European Under-17 Championship The 2016 UEFA European Under-17 Championship was the 15th edition of the UEFA European Under-17 Championship (34th edition if the Under-16 era is included), the annual European international youth football championship contested by the men's under- ...

and scored the only goal in the quarter-final victory against Sweden. In June 2021, Chong accepted a call-up to the Curaçao national team for their

2021 CONCACAF Gold Cup The 2021 CONCACAF Gold Cup was the 16th edition of the CONCACAF Gold Cup, the biennial international men's soccer championship of the North, Central American, and Caribbean region organized by CONCACAF. The tournament was originally scheduled t ...

preliminary squad. However, he was not included in the final squad, which subsequently withdrew from the tournament due to an outbreak of

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickly ...

Career statistics

Honours

Club Brugge * Belgian First Division A:

2020–21 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 ...

Individual *UEFA European Under-17 Championship Team of the Tournament:

2016 File:2016 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Bombed-out buildings in Ankara following the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt; the Impeachment of Dilma Rousseff, impeachment trial of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff; Damaged houses duri ...

: 2017–18 * Denzil Haroun Reserve Player of the Year: 2018–19 *

Premier League 2 The Professional Development League is a system of youth football leagues that are managed, organised and controlled by the Premier League or by the Football League. It was introduced by the Football Association via the Elite Player Performanc ...

Player of the Month: December 2019

References

External links

Profile
at ManUtd.com
Ons Oranje U21 Profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chong, Tahith 1999 births Living people People from Willemstad Dutch footballers Curaçao footballers Netherlands under-21 international footballers Netherlands youth international footballers Association football wingers Manchester United F.C. players SV Werder Bremen players Club Brugge KV players Birmingham City F.C. players Premier League players Bundesliga players Belgian Pro League players English Football League players Dutch people of Curaçao descent Dutch people of Chinese descent Curaçao people of Chinese descent Sportspeople of Chinese descent Dutch expatriate footballers Expatriate footballers in Belgium Expatriate footballers in England Expatriate footballers in Germany Dutch expatriate sportspeople in Belgium Dutch expatriate sportspeople in England Dutch expatriate sportspeople in Germany