Cristian Nicolás Medina (born 1 June 2002) is an Argentine 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 le ...

who plays as a

central 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 boundarie ...

for

Boca Juniors Club Atlético Boca Juniors () is an Argentine sports club headquartered in La Boca, a neighbourhood of Buenos Aires. The club is mostly known for its professional football team which, since its promotion in 1913, has always played in the A ...

Club career

Medina came through the youth ranks at Rayo de Malaver, before moving to

in November 2012. He remained in their youth system across the next eight years, with the midfielder notably scoring a rabona goal in an academy

Superclásico Superclásico is the football match in Argentina between Buenos Aires rivals Boca Juniors and River Plate. It derives from the Spanish usage of "clásico" to mean derby, with the prefix "super" used as the two clubs are the most popular and su ...

versus River Plate in April 2018. Medina was promoted into the first-team in mid-2020, as he appeared on the substitute's bench six times under manager

Miguel Ángel Russo Miguel Ángel Russo (born 9 April 1956) is an Argentine professional football manager and former player who played as a defensive midfielder. He is the current manager of Rosario Central. Playing career Club career Russo was a one club man; ...

. His senior debut would arrive on 14 February 2021 in the

Copa de la Liga Profesional The Copa de la Liga Profesional (English: ''Professional League Cup''; officially named "Copa Diego Armando Maradona" in its first edition) is an official Argentine football cup competition. The cup was planned and organised by the "Liga Profesi ...

against Gimnasia y Esgrima, as he replaced

Leonardo Jara Leonardo Jara (born May 20, 1991) is an Argentine footballer who plays as a right-back for Argentine Primera División club Vélez Sarsfield. Career Before Leonardo joined Boca Juniors, he played for Estudiantes. D.C. United On January 3 ...

with twenty minutes remaining at La Bombonera.

International career

Medina was part of Argentina's U15 squad that won the 2017 South American Championship under manager

Diego Placente Diego Rodolfo Placente (born 24 April 1977) is a former Argentine footballer who played as a left-back. Club career Born in Buenos Aires, Placente started playing professionally in 1996 with Argentinos Juniors, before moving to Argentine gian ...

on home soil, as they defeated

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

in the final. Two years later, Medina was selected by

Pablo Aimar Pablo César Aimar (born 3 November 1979) is an Argentine former professional Association football, footballer and current assistant coach of the Argentina national football team, Argentina national team. Aimar played as an Midfielder#Attacking ...

's U17s for the 2019 South American Championship in Peru and the 2019 FIFA World Cup in Brazil. He scored once, versus

Paraguay Paraguay (; ), officially the Republic of Paraguay ( es, República del Paraguay, links=no; gn, Tavakuairetã Paraguái, links=si), is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to th ...

, in seven matches as they won the former competition, prior to featuring three times at the latter; as they reached the round of sixteen.

Style of play

Medina is primarily a

, though is capable of playing in various positions across the midfield. He was dubbed the next Fernando Gago by some Argentine media.

Career statistics

Notes

Honours

Boca Juniors *

Primera División Primera may refer to * Nissan Primera, a car * Primera Air, a former airline * Primera división (disambiguation), multiple top division football leagues * Primera, Texas, a town in Cameron County, Texas * Alí Primera, Venezuelan musician, compos ...

2022 File:2022 collage V1.png, Clockwise, from top left: Road junction at Yamato-Saidaiji Station several hours after the assassination of Shinzo Abe; 2022 Sri Lankan protests, Anti-government protest in Sri Lanka in front of the Presidential Secretari ...

* Copa Argentina: 2019–20 *

2020 2020 was heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to global Social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, social and Economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, economic disruption, mass cancellations and postponements of events, COVID- ...

* Supercopa Argentina:

Argentina U15 *

South American U-15 Championship The South American U-15 Championship, also known as the Campeonato Sudamericano Sub15, is a South American association football competition held every two years contested by male players under the age of 15 and is organized by CONMEBOL, the governi ...

2017 File:2017 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The War Against ISIS at the Battle of Mosul (2016-2017); aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing; The Solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 ("Great American Eclipse"); North Korea tests a ser ...

Argentina U17 *

South American U-17 Championship The South American U-17 Championship (; ) is a football competition held every two years for South American under-17 teams. The tournament was born in 1985 out of a need for a classification tournament for the newly created FIFA U-16 World Cup (now ...

2019 File:2019 collage v1.png, From top left, clockwise: Hong Kong protests turn to widespread riots and civil disobedience; House of Representatives votes to adopt articles of impeachment against Donald Trump; CRISPR gene editing first used to experim ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Medina, Cristian 2002 births Living people People from Moreno Partido Argentine men's footballers Argentina men's youth international footballers Men's association football midfielders Argentine Primera División players Boca Juniors footballers Footballers from Buenos Aires Province