Youssef El Kachati

Youssef El Kachati (born 30 November 1999) is a Moroccan professional footballer who plays as a forward or winger for club Telstar.

Club career
After originally joining Sparta Rotterdam's academy in 2016 from youth club Noordwijk, he signed a one-and-a-half-year professional contract with the club on 16 December 2018. He made his debut in Sparta's first team on 14 October 2018 in a 3–0 Eerste Divisie victory against Cambuur. He came on as a substitute for Ilias Alhaft in the 66th minute and received his first yellow card a minute later for diving. In 2020, El Kachati returned to Noordwijk to gain playing time in the Tweede Divisie. From in 2021, he moved to Belgium where he represented the under-21 team of Westerlo before joining Quick Boys in the Dutch Tweede Divisie in February 2022.

In the 2022–23 season, El Kachati emerged as a prolific striker and was the top goalscorer of the Tweede Divisie halfway through the season. This sparked interest from clubs in both professional and amateur football. In December 2022, Quick Boys announced that El Kachati, his management, and the club had failed to reach an agreement on a contract extension.

In January 2023, it was announced that El Kachati would be joining IJsselmeervogels for the upcoming season. He signed a contract until mid-2024. However, it later became known that due to an agreement between IJsselmeervogels and Telstar, he would instead be playing for professional Eerste Divisie club Telstar from the 2023–24 season onwards. He made his debut for the club on 14 August, starting in a 1–0 league loss on the opening day of the season to Jong PSV. On 2 February 2024, El Kachati scored his first goal for Telstar in a 6–1 loss to MVV. The following week, he scored a brace to help Telstar to a 3–2 victory over Helmond Sport.

International career
El Kachati debuted for the Morocco U23s in a 2–0 2019 Africa U-23 Cup of Nations qualification loss to the DR Congo U23s on 20 March 2019.