Alberto Zapater Arjol (born 13 June 1985) is a Spanish 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 ...

who plays for and captains

Real Zaragoza Real Zaragoza, S.A.D. (), commonly referred to as Zaragoza, is a football club based in Zaragoza, Aragon, Spain, that currently competes in the Segunda División, the second tier of the Spanish league system. Zaragoza holds its home games at L ...

mainly as a

defensive midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundari ...

. He spent most of his career with

Zaragoza Zaragoza, also known in English as Saragossa,''Encyclopædia Britannica'"Zaragoza (conventional Saragossa)" is the capital city of the Zaragoza Province and of the autonomous community of Aragon, Spain. It lies by the Ebro river and its tributari ...

, appearing in 392 official games and scoring 11 goals.

Club career

Zaragoza

Zapater was born in

Ejea de los Caballeros Ejea de los Caballeros (); an, Exeya d'os Caballers; (commonly known simply as Ejea) is a town and municipality in the province of Zaragoza, part of the autonomous community of Aragon, Spain. It is one of the five main towns in the ''Comarca de l ...

Province of Zaragoza Zaragoza (), also called Saragossa in English,''Encyclopædia Britannica''Zaragoza (conventional Saragossa)/ref> is a province of northern Spain, in the central part of the autonomous community of Aragon. Its capital is Zaragoza, which is also t ...

. In 2004, he was first touted as a promising player after scoring 12 goals for hometown's

in the youth leagues. The first-team manager, former Spanish international Víctor Muñoz, was impressed enough, allowing Zapater to join the first team in pre-season training. He was given his official debut on Zaragoza's first game of 2004–05, against

Valencia CF Valencia Club de Fútbol (, ca-valencia, València Club de Futbol ), commonly referred to as Valencia CF (or simply Valencia) is a professional football club based in Valencia, Spain, that currently plays in La Liga, the top flight of the Spa ...

in the Spanish Supercup: although the Aragonese ended up losing 0–1 he put up a solid performance overall, confirmed in the 3–1 second leg away win. At just 19, Zapater went on to feature in 31

La Liga The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Primera División, commonly known simply as Primera División in Spain, and as La Liga in English-speaking countries and officially as LaLiga Santander for sponsorship reasons, stylized as LaLiga, is the men' ...

matches during the league campaign, netting in a 2 March 2005 defeat at Real Sociedad where he was also

sent off In sports, an ejection (also known as dismissal, sending-off, disqualification, or early shower) is the removal of a participant from a contest due to a violation of the sport's rules. The exact violations that lead to an ejection vary depending ...

. In the following season, he helped the club finish as runners-up in the

Copa del Rey The Campeonato de España–Copa de Su Majestad el Rey, commonly known as Copa del Rey or simply La Copa and formerly known as Copa del Presidente de la República (1932–36) and Copa del Generalísimo (1939–76), is an annual knockout footb ...

– losing the final to

RCD Espanyol Reial Club Deportiu Espanyol de Barcelona (; "Royal Spanish Sports Club of Barcelona"), commonly known as Espanyol, is a professional sports club based in Barcelona, Spain, that competes in La Liga, the top tier of the Spanish football league s ...

– while also only missing three league matches; his strong tackling and the amount of fouls he committed earned him the nickname of 'The Bull', given by

Diego Maradona Diego Armando Maradona (; 30 October 196025 November 2020) was an Argentine professional football player and manager. Widely regarded as one of the greatest players in the history of the sport, he was one of the two joint winners of the F ...

. In the following two seasons, after renewing his contract until June 2010, Zapater remained an undisputed starter, only missing four games while experiencing qualification honours to the

UEFA Cup A cup is an open-top used to hold hot or cold liquids for pouring or drinking; while mainly used for drinking, it also can be used to store solids for pouring (e.g., sugar, flour, grains, salt). Cups may be made of glass, metal, china, clay ...

in 2006–07, and relegation the following year.

Abroad

In late July 2009, after being instrumental in Zaragoza's return to the top division, and already playing pre-season football with the ''Maños'', Zapater left for Genoa C.F.C. for around

€ The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone and unilaterally adopted by Kosovo and Montenegro. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists ...

4.5 million, as the Spaniards were also immerse in a deep financial crisis. He held an emotional press conference before parting ways with his boyhood team, whilst fans paid tribute to the player dedicating a song to him. On 17 September 2009, Zapater had the distinction of scoring the first ever goal in the Europa League proper, with a fourth-minute strike against

SK Slavia Prague Sportovní klub Slavia Praha – fotbal (Sports Club Slavia Prague – Football, ), commonly known as Slavia Praha or Slavia Prague, is a Czech professional football club in Prague. Founded in 1892, they are the second most successful club in t ...

. He started throughout most of his debut season in

Serie A The Serie A (), also called Serie A TIM for national sponsorship with TIM, is a professional league competition for football clubs located at the top of the Italian football league system and the winner is awarded the Scudetto and the Cop ...

– his maiden appearance in the competition being marked with a goal and an

assist Assist or ASSIST may refer to: Sports Several sports have a statistic known as an "assist", generally relating to action by a player leading to a score by another player on their team: *Assist (basketball), a pass by a player that facilitates a ba ...

in a 3–2 home win over

A.S. Roma ' (''Rome Sport Association''), commonly referred to as Roma (), is a professional football club based in Rome, Italy. Founded by a merger in 1927, Roma has participated in the top tier of Italian football for all of its existence, except for ...

– as Genoa finished in mid-table. Before the end of the campaign and during the subsequent off-season he was linked with a move to several clubs, but nothing ever materialised. Zapater was sold to

Sporting CP Sporting Clube de Portugal, founded Sporting Club de Portugal (), otherwise referred to as Sporting CP, often known abroad as Sporting Lisbon , is a Portuguese professional sports club based in Lisbon. It is best known for the professional foot ...

on 30 July 2010, as Miguel Veloso moved in the opposite direction. Used intermittently in his only season he did appear in 34 official games for the ''Lions'', scoring four times. On 3 August 2011, Zapater moved to

FC Lokomotiv Moscow FC Lokomotiv Moscow (''FC Lokomotiv Moskva'', russian: link=no, Футбольный клуб "Локомотив" Москва, ) is a Russian professional football club based in Moscow. Lokomotiv have won the Russian Premier League on three o ...

on a free transfer, signing a five-year contract. He made his first

Russian Premier League The Russian Premier League (RPL; russian: Российская премьер-лига; РПЛ), also written as Russian Premier Liga, is the top division professional association football league in Russia. It was established at the end of 2001 ...

appearance on 11 September, setting up Manuel da Costa's goal in a 4–2 win over FC Zenit Saint Petersburg. In an interview with a newspaper from his native region (

El Periódico de Aragón ''El Periódico de Aragón'' is an Aragonese daily newspaper, founded in Zaragoza, on 23 October 1990 by Juancho Dumall. It is published by the Grupo Zeta and whose information focuses primarily on Section Aragon, Opinion and Sports. History '' ...

) in late 2012, he spoke of his development in the new reality and his efforts to learn the Russian language.

Return to Zaragoza

On 19 June 2016, Zapater returned to Zaragoza after agreeing to a two-year deal.

International career

Zapater took part in the

2005 FIFA World Youth Championship The 2005 FIFA World Youth Championship was the 15th edition of the FIFA World Youth Championship. It took place in the Netherlands between 10 June and 2 July 2005. Venues Qualification The following 24 teams qualified for the 2005 FIFA Wor ...

, in a Spanish team that also featured future senior internationals

Cesc Fàbregas Francesc "Cesc" Fàbregas Soler (; ; born 4 May 1987) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays as a central midfielder for Italian Serie B club Como. Fàbregas came through ''La Masia'', Barcelona's youth academy, leaving at 16 when ...

Fernando Llorente Fernando Javier Llorente Torres (; born 26 February 1985), nicknamed ''El Rey León'' ("The Lion King" in Spanish), is a Spanish professional footballer who plays as a striker. He started his career with Athletic Bilbao, working his way throu ...

and

David Silva David Josué Jiménez Silva (born 8 January 1986) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays for La Liga club Real Sociedad. Silva plays mainly as a central or an attacking midfielder but can also play as a winger or second striker. He is ...

. He scored his first and the only goal in a 3–1 defeat to

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

in the quarter-finals. After that, Zapater immediately established himself as an under-21 regular.

Career statistics

Honours

Zaragoza * Supercopa de España: 2004 *

runner-up: 2005–06

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Zapater, Alberto 1985 births Living people People from Cinco Villas, Aragon Sportspeople from the Province of Zaragoza Spanish footballers Footballers from Aragon Association football midfielders La Liga players Segunda División players Real Zaragoza players Serie A players Genoa C.F.C. players Primeira Liga players Sporting CP footballers Russian Premier League players FC Lokomotiv Moscow players Spain youth international footballers Spain under-21 international footballers Spanish expatriate footballers Expatriate footballers in Italy Expatriate footballers in Portugal Expatriate footballers in Russia Spanish expatriate sportspeople in Italy Spanish expatriate sportspeople in Portugal Spanish expatriate sportspeople in Russia