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Ali Dia has gone down in football history. After purporting to be the cousin of legendary Ballon d’Or winning AC Milan forward George Weah, Dia managed to blag his way into a Premier League move in 1996.Graeme Souness, then working as Southampton’s manager rather than as a surly television pundit, received a phone call from a man claiming to be Weah; it was not. The voice on the other end of the line nevertheless recommended Dia to Souness, who felt that such an endorsement could not be ignored.So, Dia was handed a one-month contract and would go on to become perhaps the worst player the Premier League has ever seen...<script type="application/json" data-placement="fcplayer-semantic">{"type":"fcplayer-semantic","data":{"embedCode":"//cdn.fcp.codes/embed-code-template/embed-code-template.js#SEMANTIC_5704afb8-c10b-4ba5-9cb4-d7fb6098ef90"}}</script>

Football's craziest transfers: How 'f*cking hopeless' Ali Dia fooled Southampton into playing him in the Premier League

Premier League

Southampton

Souness was not the only manager to receive a call from the man claiming to be Weah. Harry Redknapp, then at West Ham, has recounted receiving a similar recommendation over the phone, although he gave it much shorter shrift.“He rang me at the training ground – it was George Weah," Redknapp recalled. "He rang up and said, ‘My cousin, good player, I’ve seen your team, you’re a good team but you need a goal-scorer’. I was saying, ‘Oh yeah, OK George, lovely’. I thought it was a wind-up.” Unsurprisingly, Redknapp opted against a deal.Tony Pulis also received a similar call at Gillingham and was taken in just enough to give Dia a trial. His assessment? “He was rubbish”. Alarm bells had started to ring, as Pulis was confused as to how Weah would even know of the club.‘Weah’ also called Port Vale, and they too gave Dia a run-out, in a reserve game against Middlesbrough. He didn’t play well.Souness, though, claimed that “you had to sit up and take notice” when receiving a recommendation from such an esteemed figure as Weah. Dia was hardly given a multi-year contract worth millions, but he was officially a Premier League player, and even pocketed a signing-on fee.

Hook, line and sinker

It didn’t exactly last. Souness appeared somewhat confused by Dia’s footballing CV and claimed at the time of his signing that Dia had played with Weah at Paris Saint-Germain.In fact, the club he had played for before the Saints was Blyth Spartans. At the non-league club, he made history by becoming their first-ever black player, though made only one appearance, coming off the bench against Boston United.While Dia had played in the lower reaches of French football, he had never won an international cap nor had he played for PSG, as 'Weah' had claimed.Multiple potential sources of the hoax have been reported; some claim it was a friend of Dia impersonating Weah, while others say it was his agent. There are also reports claiming it was Dia himself, merely putting on an accent. That Souness was fooled is quite remarkable; that he gave Dia a game is something else entirely.

The true back story

In fairness, it wasn’t exactly going well for Southampton at the time. The Saints had almost been relegated the season prior, surviving only via goal difference as Manchester City went down in their stead.Souness was appointed in the summer of 1996, but he oversaw a shaky start to the season that saw the Saints win just three of their opening 13 games. Then, in the November, Dia arrived, and had been scheduled to play in a reserve game so the coaching staff could assess his quality. However, heavy rain left the pitch waterlogged and the fixture was called off.Nevertheless, Dia, despite failing to impress in training, was named on the bench for the clash with Leeds on November 23 because injuries had torn through the playing squad. And when talisman Matt Le Tissier became the latest victim, Dia was summoned from the bench.He played 53 minutes of the game before being substituted himself, and Le Tissier remembers that Dia was “f*cking hopeless”, while Souness claimed seeing him play so badly was like a “kick in the b*llocks”.Dia went into training on the Sunday, but it was a day off for the players, and Le Tisser claims the fake player “did a runner”, as he simply did not show up on the Monday.

The cameo

Dia, though, pleaded his innocence. He claimed after the fact that he was not a “con man” and that it was his agent who must have been pretending to be Weah while talking to clubs. Souness insisted he wasn’t “duped” as Dia was an international player, but he wasn’t, and there is no record of him ever winning a cap.Instead, in December of that year, Dia dropped down to non-league level once again, joining Gateshead, and he said at the time that the move to Southampton was a “misunderstanding.” He also, however, claimed to have played for Senegal and scored in a World Cup qualifier, which did not happen.Reportedly, Dia earned £2,000 from his time with the Saints and was able to then parlay that into becoming Gateshead’s highest earner. He actually scored for the club on his debut, and would add one more to his tally across an eight-game spell.

Dia's defence

While reports suggest that Dia enrolled at Northumbria University after leaving Gateshead, it is unclear where exactly he is now. In 2016, he was interviewed by <a href="https://thelab.bleacherreport.com/finding-ali-dia/" target="_blank">Bleacher Report</a> and was living in London, although he was aiming to move to Qatar.Even in that interview, untruths appeared to spill out, as Dia said he trained with Southampton for over a month, impressed and earned his way onto the bench against Leeds. Neither Souness nor any Southampton squad member at the time has corroborated the claim.He does leave a footballing legacy, though, as his son, Simon, has enjoyed a footballing career that has taken him all over the world. He currently plays for Bangkok in the Thai League, having previously played for Valenciennes and Amiens in France, as well as clubs in Bahrain, Belgium and Qatar.At no point, that we know of, has Simon claimed to know George Weah to earn himself a bigger move, and at the age of 32, is continuing to plug away.His father is clearly the bigger name, but for all the wrong reasons. Dia's move to Southampton is one of football’s craziest transfers, and one that surely still keeps Souness up at night. &nbsp;

Disappearing act

Football's craziest transfers: How 'f*cking hopeless' Ali Dia fooled Southampton into playing him in the Premier League | Goal.com

GOAL takes a look at the craziest transfers in football history, continuing with fake footballer Ali Dia&apos;s infamous move to Southampton

Football&apos;s craziest transfers: How &apos;f*cking hopeless&apos; Ali Dia fooled Southampton into playing him in the Premier League