Bilel Mohsni doesn’t know what position Paul Jewell plans to play him at Ipswich Town
IPSWICH Town loanee Bilel Mohsni admits he doesn’t know what position Blues boss Paul Jewell will play him in over the period of his three-month loan.
The 25-year-old Frenchman arrived in England as a centre-back two years ago, but his 6ft 3in frame and physical approach meant he was soon converted to striker by Southend United.
Scoring 13 goals for the League Two play-off losers last season, he ended up playing on the left-wing and has also filled in at numerous other positions.
During a recent trial at Ipswich Town, Mohsni played at centre-back during an Under-21 fixture, scoring one and setting up another in a 6-0 win over Cardiff City. However, he made his debut as a striker in the closing stages of last Saturday’s 2-1 home defeat to the same club.
“When I came (to England) I was a centre-back,” explains Mohsni. “But after a couple of injuries in the squad they tried me at centre-forward in training on a Friday. I scored a lot of goals and afterwards the manager asked me ‘do you think you can play striker?’ I said ‘no, but if you need me why not?’
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“He put me on, I scored, he said he was a lucky manager and didn’t want to change his team so after that I ended up playing striker quite a lot.
“I had some very good players in the team and they knew that if they put the ball in the box I could score.”
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Asked where Jewell was planning on playing him, Mohsni added: “I don’t know! We’ll see. He put me on as striker (on Saturday), but he knows I can also play left-wing, right-wing, centre-mid. I’m happy in any position – it’s better to be in the starting eleven than on the bench.”
Meanwhile, Mohsni revealed that he only took up football at the age of 11 after originally focusing on the sport of judo.
The volatile player – who has picked up 19 bookings and three red cards during his first two seasons in English football – said: “In 1998 everyone wanted to play football in France after we won the World Cup. Before I was playing judo and I didn’t really like football.
“After the World Cup all of my friend splayed football though, I started playing in a club and it went from there.”
