Fabian Lustenberger (born 2 May 1988) is a Swiss 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 defender for and captains

BSC Young Boys BSC Young Boys (YB by short abbreviation ) are a Swiss sports club based in Bern, Switzerland. Its first team has won 15 Swiss league championships and six Swiss Cups. YB is one of the most successful Swiss football clubs internationally, reac ...

. He has earned three caps with the Switzerland national team.

Career

FC Luzern

In his first season for

FC Luzern Fussball-Club Luzern (), or simply abbreviated to FCL, is a Swiss sports club based in Lucerne (german: Luzern). It is best known for its professional football team, which plays in the Super League, the top tier of the Swiss football league syste ...

, Lustenberger succeeded in integrating himself into the team. He earned increasingly more respect from manager

Ciriaco Sforza Ciriaco Sforza (; born 2 March 1970) is a Swiss football manager and former professional player who last managed Swiss Super League club Basel. After beginning his career with Swiss clubs FC Aarau and Grasshopper Club Zürich, he most notably p ...

, and by the winter break, he had earned a spot in Luzern's starting eleven.

Hertha BSC

In August 2007, Lustenberger transferred to

Hertha BSC Hertha, Berliner Sport-Club e. V., commonly known as Hertha BSC (), and sometimes referred to as Hertha Berlin, Hertha BSC Berlin, or simply Hertha, is a German professional football club based in the locality of Westend of the borough of Charl ...

in the Bundesliga for 1.5 million Euros. In his first season with Hertha, he made 24 Bundesliga appearances. He scored his first Bundesliga goal during a Hertha 2–1 loss to 1. FC Nürnberg in December 2007. Although he was never a consistent starter, Lustenberger earned 37 caps over the two seasons that followed, and stayed with Hertha when the club was relegated to the 2. Bundesliga at the end of the 2009–10 season. During the 2010 summer break, he sustained an injury that ruled him out for almost four months. In his first game back, Lustenberger was forced to play the last eight minutes as goalkeeper, following the expulsion of Marco Sejna. Since 2013, Lustenberger has been the captain of the Berlin side, after helping Hertha BSC return to the

Bundesliga The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany. At the top of the German football league system, the Bundesliga is Germany's primary footba ...

after a season in 2. Bundesliga. On 9 March 2016, he extended his contract until 2019. In 2019, after 12 years in Berlin, Lustenberger confirmed that he would not extend his contract and would leave Hertha and move back to Switzerland joining Young Boys Bern on a free. Lustenberger played his final game for Hertha in a 5–1 home defeat to Bayer Leverkusen, spending his final 20 minutes on the pitch as captain after Vedad Ibisevic was subbed off. He ended his career in Berlin with 308 appearances for the club.

Young Boys

On 28 January 2019,

announced that Lustenberger would join the club from the upcoming 2019/20 season. He penned a three-year deal.

Personal life

His brother Simon is also a footballer who plays for the

reserves. He is not related to his former Luzern teammate Claudio Lustenberger.

Career statistics

Club

International

Honours

Hertha BSC * 2. Bundesliga: 2010–11, 2012–13 Young Boys *

Swiss Super League The Swiss Super League (known as the Credit Suisse Super League for sponsorship reasons) is a Swiss professional league in the top tier of the Swiss football league system and has been played in its current format since the 2003–04 season ...

: 2019–20,

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 ...

2022–23 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 ...

Swiss Cup The Swiss Cup (; ; ; ) is a football cup tournament that has been organised annually since 1925–26 by the Swiss Football Association. Since 1999 the winner earns the chance to qualify for the UEFA Europa League or the UEFA Europa Conference L ...

: 2019–20,

Individual

* Swiss Super League Team of the Year:

References

External links

Fabian Lustenberger
at HerthaBSC.de * 1988 births Living people People from Willisau District Swiss-German people Swiss men's footballers Switzerland men's international footballers Switzerland men's under-21 international footballers Men's association football midfielders Swiss Super League players Swiss Challenge League players Bundesliga players 2. Bundesliga players Regionalliga players Oberliga (football) players FC Luzern players Hertha BSC players BSC Young Boys players Expatriate men's footballers in Germany Swiss expatriate sportspeople in Germany Footballers from the canton of Lucerne {{Switzerland-footy-midfielder-stub