Tesfaldet Simon Tekie (born 4 June 1997) is a Swedish 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

central 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

Hammarby IF Hammarby Idrottsförening ("Hammarby Sports Club"), commonly known as Hammarby IF or simply Hammarby ( or, especially locally, ), is a Swedish sports club located in Stockholm, with a number of member organizations active in a variety of differe ...

Allsvenskan Allsvenskan (; en, the All-Swedish, also known as Fotbollsallsvenskan, en, the Football All-Swedish) is a Swedish professional league for men's association football clubs. It was founded in 1924 and is the top tier of the Swedish football lea ...

Early life

Born in

Eritrea Eritrea ( ; ti, ኤርትራ, Ertra, ; ar, إرتريا, ʾIritriyā), officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa region of Eastern Africa, with its capital and largest city at Asmara. It is bordered by Ethiopia ...

, Tekie moved to

Gothenburg Gothenburg (; abbreviated Gbg; sv, Göteborg ) is the second-largest city in Sweden, fifth-largest in the Nordic countries, and capital of the Västra Götaland County. It is situated by the Kattegat, on the west coast of Sweden, and has ...

, Sweden, as a nine-year-old. He started to play youth football with local club Marieholms BoIK, before joining

Gunnilse IS Gunnilse IS is a Swedish football club located in Angered, a suburb of Gothenburg. Background Since their foundation on 16 September 1950 Gunnilse IS has participated mainly in the middle and lower divisions of the Swedish football league syste ...

in 2010. In 2013, at age 15, Tekie made his debut in senior football with Gunnilse, making six league appearances in Division 3, Sweden's fifth tier.

Club career

IFK Norrköping

On 6 August 2013, Tekie moved to

IFK Norrköping Idrottsföreningen Kamraterna Norrköping, more commonly known as IFK Norrköping or simply Norrköping, is a Swedish professional football club based in Norrköping. The club is affiliated to Östergötlands Fotbollförbund and play their ...

, together with his teammate Ihab Naser from Gunnilse. In 2014, he was sent on loan to affiliated club

IF Sylvia IF Sylvia is a Swedish football club based in Norrköping. The club, formed on 19 May 1922, is currently playing in the third tier of Swedish football, Division 1. The club is affiliated to the Östergötlands Fotbollförbund. In the early years ...

in Division 1, the domestic third tier, making 11 appearances. In 2015, Tekie made six appearances for IFK Norrköping in

, being part of the squad that won the Swedish championship. On 19 July the same year, he signed a new three-and-a-half-year contract with the club. In 2016, Tekie made 26 league appearances for IFK Norrköping, that finished 3rd in the Allsvenskan table. He also featured in both legs as the club was knocked out in the second qualifying round of the

2016–17 UEFA Champions League The 2016–17 UEFA Champions League was the 62nd season of Europe's premier club football tournament organised by UEFA, and the 25th season since it was renamed from the European Champion Clubs' Cup to the UEFA Champions League. The final was pla ...

, losing 4–5 on aggregate to Rosenborg.

Gent

On 19 January 2017, Tekie transferred to

Belgian First Division A The Belgian Pro League,(officially the Jupiler Pro League due to sponsorship reasons with Jupiler), is the top league competition for association football clubs in Belgium. Contested by 18 clubs since the 2020–21 season and reduced to 16 team ...

club

Gent Gent is a shortened form of the word gentleman. It may also refer to: * Ghent (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 Ghent ** .gent, a ...

, signing a three-and-a-half-year contract. The transfer fee was reportedly set at around €1.6 million. Tekie failed to make any competitive appearances for Gent, before leaving the club by mutual consent on 3 September 2019.

Loan to Östersunds FK

Tekie failed to make any competitive appearances for Gent. On 1 January 2018, he was sent on a one-and-a-half-year loan to

Östersunds FK Östersunds Fotbollsklubb, commonly known simply as Östersunds FK, Östersund () or (especially locally) ÖFK, is a Swedish professional football club located in Östersund, Sweden and since 2022 play in the Swedish second tier, Superettan. The ...

in Allsvenskan. In February, Tekie played in both legs as Östersund was knocked out in the round of 32 in the

2017–18 UEFA Europa League The 2017–18 UEFA Europa League was the 47th season of Europe's secondary club association football, football tournament organised by UEFA, and the 9th season since it was renamed from the UEFA Cup to the UEFA Europa League. The 2018 UEFA Europ ...

, losing 2–4 on aggregate to

Arsenal An arsenal is a place where arms and ammunition are made, maintained and repaired, stored, or issued, in any combination, whether privately or publicly owned. Arsenal and armoury (British English) or armory (American English) are mostly ...

. He went on to make 15 league appearances for the club in 2018, before his season was cut short in September due to an injury. In 2019, Tekie remained with Östersund during the first half of the season, making 12 appearances, before returning to Gent in June.

Fortuna Sittard

On 9 September 2019, Tekie signed a two-year contract with the option of a third with

Fortuna Sittard Fortuna Sittard (; li, Fortuna Zitterd ) is a football club in Sittard, Netherlands. The club currently plays its football in the 12,500 capacity Fortuna Sittard Stadion and features in the Eredivisie. The club was established through a merger ...

in the Dutch

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 ...

. In his debut season in 2019–20, he established himself as a starter for his new club and played 20 games, before the league was abandoned in April 2020 due to the

COVID-19 pandemic in the Netherlands The COVID-19 pandemic in the Netherlands has resulted in confirmed cases of COVID-19 and deaths. The virus reached the Netherlands on 27 February 2020, when its first COVID-19 case was confirmed in Tilburg. It involved a 56-year-old Dutchman ...

. In 2020–21, Tekie made 33 league appearances, helping Fortuna Sittard to finish 11th in the Eredivisie table. On 30 March 2021, the club decided to exercise their option to extend his contract for one further season. In 2021–22, Fortuna Sittard finished 15th in the league, one place above the relegation zone, with Tekie making 27 appearances. In May 2022, it was announced that he would leave the club during the summer at the expiration of his contract.

Go Ahead Eagles

On 8 September 2022, Tekie signed a one-year contract with

Go Ahead Eagles Go Ahead Eagles () are a Dutch professional football club from the city of Deventer. They play in the Eredivisie, the top tier of Dutch football, having achieved promotion from the second tier Eerste Divisie in the 2020-21 season. The club's h ...

. He made eight appearances in the 2022–23 Eredivisie, before leaving on 31 January 2023 by mutual consent after he had struggled to find motivation at the club.

Hammarby IF

On 9 February 2023, Tekie returned to Sweden and signed a four-year contract with

. After establishing himself as a regular for the club, making 16 league appearances during the first half of the season, he fell out of favor with head coach

Martí Cifuentes Martí Cifuentes Corvillo (born 7 July 1982) is a Spanish football coach who is the head coach of Hammarby IF in the Swedish Allsvenskan. Career Early career Cifuentes had short spells coaching in the youth departments of Ajax and Millwall. H ...

in August the same year. He returned to Hammarby on 31 January 2024, by request of new head coach Kim Hellberg.

Loan to Apollon Limassol

On 28 August 2023, he joined

Apollon Limassol Apollon Limassol FC ( el, Απόλλων Λεμεσού, ''Apollon Lemesou'') is a Cypriot sports club, based in Limassol. It has football, basketball and volleyball teams. Founded in 1954, Apollon FC currently plays in the Cypriot First Divisi ...

in the

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 ...

on a one-year loan, with an option to buy. On 31 January 2024, the loan agreement was terminated. In total, he made 12 league appearances for Apollon Limassol.

International career

Between 2012 and 2018, Tekie was capped for all Swedish youth teams from the under-17's to the under-21's, making 11 appearances for all selections. He made his debut for the

Sweden national football team The Sweden national football team ( sv, svenska fotbollslandslaget) represents Sweden in men's international football and it is controlled by the Swedish Football Association, the governing body of football in Sweden. Sweden's home ground is F ...

on 11 January 2019 in a 2–2 friendly against

Iceland Iceland ( is, Ísland; ) is a Nordic island country in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the Arctic Ocean. Iceland is the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Iceland's capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which (along with its s ...

, as a starter.

Career statistics

Club

Honours

Club

IFK Norrköping *

2015 File:2015 Events Collage new.png, From top left, clockwise: Civil service in remembrance of November 2015 Paris attacks; Germanwings Flight 9525 was purposely crashed into the French Alps; the rubble of residences in Kathmandu following the Apri ...

References

External links

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Tekie, Tesfaldet 1997 births Living people Swedish men's footballers Sweden men's youth international footballers Sweden men's under-21 international footballers Sweden men's international footballers Swedish people of Eritrean descent Gunnilse IS players IF Sylvia players IFK Norrköping players K.A.A. Gent players Östersunds FK players Fortuna Sittard players Go Ahead Eagles players Hammarby Fotboll players Apollon Limassol FC players Ettan Fotboll players Allsvenskan players Eredivisie players Swedish expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Belgium Swedish expatriate sportspeople in Belgium Expatriate men's footballers in the Netherlands Swedish expatriate sportspeople in the Netherlands Expatriate men's footballers in Cyprus Swedish expatriate sportspeople in Cyprus Men's association football midfielders