Jairo Fernando "El Tigre" (The Tiger) Castillo Cortés (born 17 November 1977) is a retired Colombian football player. He has played for a number of clubs in Colombia,

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 ...

, Spain,

Cyprus Cyprus ; tr, Kıbrıs (), officially the Republic of Cyprus,, , lit: Republic of Cyprus is an island country located south of the Anatolian Peninsula in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Its continental position is disputed; while it is ge ...

and

Uruguay Uruguay (; ), officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay ( es, República Oriental del Uruguay), is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast; while bordering ...

Club career

Castillo started his playing career in 1994 at América de Cali, where he won the league title in 1997. In 2000, he joined Vélez Sársfield of

but returned to América de Cali after only one season where he won in 2002, another Colombian league title. In 2003, he went back to Argentina to play for Club Atlético Independiente. He then had spells in Europe with

Real Valladolid Real Valladolid Club de Fútbol, S.A.D., or simply Real Valladolid () or Valladolid, is a professional football club based in Valladolid, Castile and León, Spain that competes in La Liga, the top tier of the Spanish league system. The club c ...

of Spain and

AEL Limassol Athlitiki Enosi Lemesou ( el, Αθλητική Ένωση Λεμεσού, translation=Athletic Union of Limassol) commonly known as AEL, is a Cypriot sports club based in the city of Limassol, most famous for its football team. AEL also maintai ...

, In 2008, he joined

Defensor Sporting Defensor Sporting Club is a sports club based in Montevideo, Uruguay. Founded in 1913, Defensor has several sports sections, with football and basketball being the most important and the ones in which the club has achieved significant achievem ...

. Castillo returned to Argentina in 2008 to play for newly promoted Godoy Cruz, he scored twice on his league debut against Banfield and then on 28 September 2008 he scored a

hat-trick A hat-trick or hat trick is the achievement of a generally positive feat three times in a match, or another achievement based on the number three. Origin The term first appeared in 1858 in cricket, to describe H. H. Stephenson taking three wic ...

helping Godoy Cruz to beat Boca Juniors 4–1. Ironically, his improved form would only cause more heartbreak; being Godoy Cruz best player, he would yet again have an injury putting a major dent into his career. The next game, on 5 October 2008, away to Gimnasia, Jairo suffered a season-ending torn ACL after a hard tackle. Godoy Cruz subsequently lost their next 3 games. In September 2009, after 11 months without playtime, Jairo Castillo left Godoy Cruz after his contract with the club from Mendoza expired, and joined the ranks of Millonarios, in Bogotá, Colombia. In December 2009 the 32-year-old forward Jairo Fernando Castillo Cortés moved back to Godoy Cruz after six months in Colombia.

International career

Castillo played 23 times for the Colombia national team between 1999 and 2005,Colombia record international footballers
at

rsssf The Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation (RSSSF) is an international organization dedicated to collecting statistics about association football. The foundation aims to build an exhaustive archive of football-related information from around th ...

he was part of the squad that won their first and only Copa América title in 2001.

References

External links

Argentine Primera statistics
at Fútbol XXI

Spanish Segunda statistics
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Castillo, Jairo 1977 births Living people Association football forwards Colombian footballers Colombian expatriate footballers Colombia international footballers América de Cali footballers Atlético Bucaramanga footballers Club Atlético Vélez Sarsfield footballers Club Atlético Independiente footballers Real Valladolid players Millonarios F.C. players AEL Limassol players Defensor Sporting players Godoy Cruz Antonio Tomba footballers Querétaro F.C. footballers Atlético Tucumán footballers Boyacá Chicó F.C. footballers Expatriate footballers in Argentina Expatriate footballers in Uruguay Expatriate footballers in Mexico Expatriate footballers in Cyprus Expatriate footballers in Spain Categoría Primera A players Categoría Primera B players Argentine Primera División players La Liga players Cypriot First Division players Uruguayan Primera División players 2000 CONCACAF Gold Cup players 2001 Copa América players Copa América-winning players People from Tumaco Sportspeople from Nariño Department