Emiliano Buendía Stati (born 25 December 1996) 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 winger for club

Aston Villa Aston Villa Football Club is a professional football club based in Aston, Birmingham, England. The club competes in the , the top tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1874, they have played at their home ground, Villa Park ...

and the Argentina national team. Buendía's senior career began at

Getafe Getafe () is a municipality and a city in Spain belonging to the Community of Madrid. , it has a population of 180,747, the region's sixth most populated municipality. Getafe is located 13 km south of Madrid's city centre, within a flat ar ...

with whom he spent four years, including a short spell with Spanish club

Cultural Leonesa Cultural y Deportiva Leonesa (), better known as Cultural Leonesa or La Cultural, is a Spanish football team based in León, in the autonomous community of Castile and Leon. Founded on 5 August 1923, it currently plays in Primera División RF ...

, before he moved to England, joining

Norwich City Norwich City Football Club (also known as The Canaries or The Yellows) is an English professional football club based in Norwich, Norfolk. The club competes in the EFL Championship following their relegation from the Premier League in the 20 ...

in 2018 and Aston Villa in 2021.

Club career

Getafe

Born in

Mar del Plata Mar del Plata is a city on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean, in Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. It is the seat of General Pueyrredón district. Mar del Plata is the second largest city in Buenos Aires Province. The name "Mar del Plata" is a s ...

, Argentina, Buendía started his career with

. On 30 March 2014, still a junior, he made his senior debut, starting for the reserves in a 2–1 away win against Puerta Bonita in the

Segunda División B Segunda División B ( en, Second Division B) was the third tier of the Spanish football league system containing 102 teams divided into five groups, until it was replaced by the new structure in 2021. It was administered by the Royal Spanish Foot ...

. He scored his first goal on 13 April, with the first of a 2–0 win away to Peña Sport. Buendía started the 2014–15 season still with the reserve team and in the third level, notably scoring twice in a 3–0 home win over

Fuenlabrada Fuenlabrada () is a city and municipality of Spain located in the Community of Madrid. , it has a population of 193,586, making it the region's fourth most populated municipality. Placename The etymology of ''Fuenlabrada'' comes from the contra ...

. He played his first match as a professional on 5 December 2014, as a substitute for Ángel Lafita in a 3–0 home win against

Eibar Eibar ( eu, Eibar, es, Éibar) is a city and municipality within the province of Gipuzkoa, in the Basque Country of Spain. It is the head town of Debabarrena, one of the '' eskualde / comarca'' of Gipuzkoa. Eibar has 27,138 inhabitants ( Eustat ...

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 footbal ...

. Buendía made his

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's ...

debut on 1 February 2015, coming on as a late substitute in a 1–0 away loss against

Almería Almería (, , ) is a city and municipality of Spain, located in Andalusia. It is the capital of the province of the same name. It lies on southeastern Iberia on the Mediterranean Sea. Caliph Abd al-Rahman III founded the city in 955. The city gr ...

. He scored his first goal in the same competition on 27 September, with the second in a 3–0 home win against Levante. On 5 July 2016, despite suffering relegation with Getafe at the end of the

2015–16 La Liga The 2015–16 La Liga football season (known as the ''Liga BBVA'' for sponsorship reasons) was the 85th since its establishment. Barcelona were the defending champions. It started on 21 August 2015 and concluded on 15 May 2016. Barcelona retain ...

season, Buendía signed a new five-year contract with the club. On 27 July 2017, he was loaned to fellow second tier club

, for one year.

Norwich City

2018–2020

On 8 June 2018, Buendía signed a four-year deal with

EFL Championship The English Football League Championship (often referred to as the Championship for short or the Sky Bet Championship for sponsorship purposes) is the highest division of the English Football League (EFL) and second-highest overall in the E ...

club

. He scored his first goal for Norwich in a 1–0 win over

Brentford Brentford is a suburban town in West London, England and part of the London Borough of Hounslow. It lies at the confluence of the River Brent and the Thames, west of Charing Cross. Its economy has diverse company headquarters buildings whi ...

on 27 October, and played an integral role as one of the main creative attacking players in the team – scoring 7 further league goals as the club swept to promotion to the

Premier League The Premier League (legal name: The Football Association Premier League Limited) is the highest level of the men's English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Foo ...

and the Championship title. Fans subsequently voted him into third place in the annual Player of the Season awards. On 8 July 2019, he signed a new five-year contract to stay at Norwich until the June 2024. During December 2019, Buendía created 29 chances for his teammates, which was the most chances created by a player in a single month in the Premier League since the stat began to be recorded in 2003–04. On 7 July 2020, Buendía scored his first goal in the Premier League, coming in a 2–1 away defeat to

Watford Watford () is a town and borough in Hertfordshire, England, 15 miles northwest of Central London, on the River Colne. Initially a small market town, the Grand Junction Canal encouraged the construction of paper-making mills, print works, a ...

. Norwich would lose their next match to

West Ham West Ham is an area in East London, located east of Charing Cross in the west of the modern London Borough of Newham. The area, which lies immediately to the north of the River Thames and east of the River Lea, was originally an ancien ...

, a result which confirmed their relegation back to the Championship after only a single season in the top flight.

2020–21 season: Promotion and Championship POTS

On 6 April 2021, Buendía scored once and provided three assists in a 7–0 victory over

Huddersfield Town Huddersfield Town Association Football Club is a professional football club based in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, England, which compete in the . The team have played home games at the Kirklees Stadium since moving from Leeds Road in 1994. The ...

. On 17 April, Norwich secured automatic promotion back into the Premier League, and secured the Championship title on 1 May with a 4–1 win over

Reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of Letter (alphabet), letters, symbols, etc., especially by Visual perception, sight or Somatosensory system, touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process invo ...

. On 29 April, following a

campaign Campaign or The Campaign may refer to: Types of campaigns * Campaign, in agriculture, the period during which sugar beets are harvested and processed *Advertising campaign, a series of advertisement messages that share a single idea and theme * Bl ...

in which Buendía scored 15 league goals and added a further 16 assists, he won the EFL Championship Player of the Season award. He was also named as Norwich's Player of the Season, becoming only the fourth player from outside the British Isles to win the award.

Aston Villa

On 7 June 2021, it was announced that an agreement had been reached for Buendía to be transferred to fellow Premier League club

once he had returned from international duty with Argentina. The deal was completed on 10 June. The transfer fee was believed to be worth around £33 million, rising to £38 million with potential bonuses, and was confirmed to be both Aston Villa's record signing and Norwich City's record sale. Buendía made his debut on 14 August 2021, in a 3–2 away loss to Watford on the opening day of the 2021–22 season. He scored his first goal for Villa on 28 August 2021, in a 1–1 draw at home to Brentford in the Premier League.

International career

On 16 September 2014, Buendía was called up to the Spain under-19s. On 29 April of the following year, he was called up by Argentina under-20s for

2015 FIFA U-20 World Cup The 2015 FIFA U-20 World Cup was the twentieth edition of the FIFA U-20 World Cup since its inception in 1977 as the FIFA World Youth Championship. The competition took place for the first time in New Zealand, the third time on Oceanian soil after ...

, and joined the latter's training camp on 5 May 2015. In May 2021, Buendía was called up to the Argentina senior squad for the first time. On 1 February 2022, he made his debut in a 1–0 home victory over

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

Career statistics

Club

International

Honours

Getafe *

Segunda División play-offs 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length ...

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 ...

Norwich City *

: 2018–19,

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

Individual *EFL Championship Player of the Season: 2020–21 *

PFA Team of the Year The Professional Footballers' Association Team of the Year (often called the PFA Team of the Year, or simply the Team of the Year) is an annual award given to a set of 55 footballers across the top four tiers of men's English football; the Premie ...

: 2020–21 Championship *EFL Championship Team of the Season: 2020–21 * Norwich City Player of the Season: 2020–21

References

External links

Profile
at the Aston Villa F.C. website {{DEFAULTSORT:Buendía, Emi 1996 births Living people Sportspeople from Mar del Plata Argentine footballers Spanish footballers Association football midfielders Cadetes de San Martín players Getafe CF B players Getafe CF footballers Cultural Leonesa footballers Norwich City F.C. players Aston Villa F.C. players Segunda División B players La Liga players Segunda División players English Football League players Premier League players Spain youth international footballers Argentina under-20 international footballers Argentina international footballers Argentine expatriate footballers Spanish expatriate footballers Expatriate footballers in England Argentine expatriate sportspeople in England Spanish expatriate sportspeople in England Argentine emigrants to Spain