Tyrell Johannes Chicco Malacia (born 17 August 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 le ...

who plays as a

left-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield position whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Centre-backs are usually positioned in pairs, with one full-back on either s ...

for

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 Foo ...

club

Manchester United Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...

and the Netherlands national team. Malacia joined

Feyenoord Feyenoord Rotterdam () is a Dutch professional 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 before settling on being called after its ...

's youth system at the age of nine. He made his professional debut for the club in December 2017, and won the

KNVB Cup The KNVB Beker (; en, KNVB Cup), branded as the TOTO KNVB Beker for sponsorship reasons, is a competition in the Netherlands organized by the Royal Dutch Football Association (KNVB) since 1898. It was based on the format of the English FA Cup. Ou ...

in 2018. He was named in the

UEFA Europa Conference League The UEFA Europa Conference League (abbreviated as UECL) is an annual football club competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European football clubs. Clubs qualify for the competition based on their ...

Team of the Season in 2022, after earning a runners-up medal in the competition. Later that year, he joined Manchester United. Malacia was a youth international for the Netherlands from under-16 to under-21 level, before making his senior international debut against Montenegro in September 2021.

Club career

Feyenoord

Malacia was born in

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 ''"N ...

, and joined the

youth academy at the age of nine in 2008. He signed his first professional contract with them on 2 December 2015. He made his professional debut for Feyenoord in a 2–1

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 ...

win against

Napoli Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

on 6 December 2017, wherein he played the full 90 minutes. Malacia made his

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 ...

debut for Feyenoord in a 1–1 tie with

SC Heerenveen Sportclub Heerenveen (; West Frisian: Sportklub It Hearrenfean) is a Dutch football club from Heerenveen. They currently play in the Eredivisie, the top level of football in the Netherlands. History Sportclub Heerenveen was founded on 20 July ...

on 13 December 2017. He was an unused substitute in the 2018 KNVB Cup Final, where Feyenoord beat

AZ Alkmaar Alkmaar Zaanstreek (), better known as AZ Alkmaar or simply AZ (), is a Dutch professional football club from Alkmaar and the Zaan district. The club plays in the Eredivisie, the highest professional football league in the Netherlands, and ho ...

3–0. On 25 May 2022, he started in Feyenoord's 1–0 UEFA Europa Conference League Final loss against

Roma Roma or ROMA may refer to: Places Australia * Roma, Queensland, a town ** Roma Airport ** Roma Courthouse ** Electoral district of Roma, defunct ** Town of Roma, defunct town, now part of the Maranoa Regional Council *Roma Street, Brisbane, a ...

in Albania. He was later one of five Feyenoord players named in the competition's Team of the Season.

Manchester United

On 5 July 2022, Malacia signed a four-year contract with

club

, with the option of a further year. United paid Feyenoord an initial fee of €15 million (£13 million), with an extra €2 million (£1.7 million) in add-ons, to make Malacia the club's first signing under manager

Erik ten Hag Erik ten Hag (, born 2 February 1970) is a Dutch professional football coach and former player, who is currently the manager of Premier League club Manchester United. As a player, Ten Hag played as a centre-back in the Dutch league for 13 years ...

. Two days later, it was confirmed that he would wear the number 12 shirt last worn by

Chris Smalling Christopher Lloyd Smalling (born 22 November 1989) is an English professional footballer who plays as a centre-back for Serie A club Roma. Smalling represented the England national team from 2011 to 2017. During his youth, Smalling played fo ...

. On 7 August, Malacia made his club debut as a substitute in a 2–1 home loss against

Brighton & Hove Albion Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club (), commonly referred to simply as Brighton, is an English professional football club based in the city of Brighton and Hove. They compete in the Premier League, the top tier of the English football league ...

in the Premier League. On 22 August 2022, Malacia started for the first time for United in a 2–1 win against

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...

. On 26 February 2023, he featured in the United squad to win the Carabao Cup 2-0 against Newcastle United, his first trophy with the club.

International career

Malacia was born in the Netherlands, to a Curaçaoan father and Surinamese mother. Malacia was a youth international who represented the Netherlands at under-16, under-17, under-18,

under-20 Junior is a category of athletics in which athletes compete under the age of 20 years. Countries all around the world compete in athletics. World Junior Athletics Competitions are held every two years which contain the best junior competitors in ...

and under-21 levels. He was called up to the preliminary squad for the Curaçao national team for the

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 ...

. On 27 August 2021, Malacia received his first call-up for the

Netherlands national football team The Netherlands national football team ( nl, Nederlands voetbalelftal or simply ''Het Nederlands elftal'') has represented the Netherlands in international men's football matches since 1905. The men's national team is controlled by the Royal Du ...

for the

2022 FIFA World Cup qualification The 2022 FIFA World Cup qualificationAlso the "FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 Qualifiers". was the qualifying process which decided the 31 teams that would join hosts Qatar, who received an automatic spot, at the 2022 FIFA World Cup. Parallel tour ...

matches against Norway, Montenegro and Turkey. He made his debut on 4 September 2021 in the match against Montenegro.

Career statistics

Club

International

Honours

Feyenoord *

: 2017–18 *

Johan Cruyff Shield The Johan Cruyff Shield (, ) is a football trophy in the Netherlands named after Dutch footballer Johan Cruyff, also often referred to as the Dutch Super Cup. The winner is decided in one match only, played by the winner of the national footbal ...

2018 File:2018 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in PyeongChang, South Korea; Protests erupt following the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives protests take place across the United ...

runner-up: 2021–22 Manchester United *

EFL Cup The EFL Cup (referred to historically, and colloquially, as the League Cup), currently known as the Carabao Cup for sponsorship reasons, is an annual knockout competition and major trophy in men's domestic football in England. Organised by the ...

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 ...

Individual *UEFA Europa Conference League Team of the Season: 2021–22 *

Talent of the Month: April 2019

References

External links

Profile
at the Manchester United website
Profile
at the Royal Dutch Football Association website (in Dutch) * {{DEFAULTSORT:Malacia, Tyrell 1999 births Living people Footballers from Rotterdam Dutch footballers Association football defenders Feyenoord players Manchester United F.C. players Eredivisie players Premier League players 2022 FIFA World Cup players Netherlands youth international footballers Netherlands under-21 international footballers Netherlands international footballers Dutch expatriate footballers Expatriate footballers in England Dutch expatriate sportspeople in England Dutch people of Curaçao descent Dutch sportspeople of Surinamese descent