Dilan Markanday

Dilan Markanday — Biography

Dilan Markanday is an English right winger who came up through the Tottenham Hotspur academy. He is remembered as the first British Asian to play a competitive match for Tottenham's men's first team, and he now turns out for League Two side Chesterfield.

Markanday entered Tottenham's academy in 2012, and in January 2021 he agreed a new deal running to June 2022. His senior debut came on 21 October 2021 in the Europa Conference League, a 1-0 loss at Vitesse. In January 2022 Championship club Blackburn Rovers brought him in on a contract of three and a half years. He opened his account for them on 10 August 2022, in the EFL Cup against Hartlepool United (4-0), and at the end of January 2023 he went to Aberdeen of the Scottish Premiership, on loan for the rest of that season. A 20th-minute strike on 5 August 2023, in a 2-1 victory over West Bromwich Albion, was his first goal in the league and the first Blackburn scored that season.

In August 2024 he spent time at Chesterfield on a loan meant to last the whole season; Blackburn recalled him in January 2025 and sent him to League One club Leyton Orient for the remainder of the campaign. That May the club said his contract would not be renewed, and on 17 June 2025 Chesterfield announced a three-year contract for him. A Londoner from Barnet, he went to school at the Haberdashers' Boys' School in Elstree, and he names the former Manchester United player Ryan Giggs as his idol.