Juan Carlos García Barahona (8 March 1988 – 8 January 2018) was a Honduran 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 played as a left-back. He began his career at Marathón and later went on to Olimpia. He signed for

Wigan Athletic Wigan Athletic Football Club () is an English professional association football club based in Wigan, Greater Manchester, England. The team competes in the Championship, the second tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1932, ...

in 2013, where he made one appearance in the

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. He also had a loan spell at Tenerife in which he did not play a match. A full international from 2009 to 2014. García earned 39 caps for

Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. The republic of Honduras is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Oce ...

. He was included in their squads for three CONCACAF Gold Cups and the

2014 FIFA World Cup The 2014 FIFA World Cup was the 20th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for men's national football teams organised by FIFA. It took place in Brazil from 12 June to 13 July 2014, after the country was awarded the hosting ri ...

Club career

Marathón

García came through the youth ranks of and started his senior career with C.D. Marathón.

Olimpia

On 12 July 2010, it was announced García would move on a free transfer to CD Olimpia. He made his first appearance for the club in the Liga Nacional de Fútbol de Honduras against

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in a 2–0 victory. García was heavily criticized by the club's followers in the two finals of the Liga Nacional de Fútbol de Honduras in which he played. On 11 December 2010, in the second leg final against

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in the Apertura, Juan Carlos García was sent off in the 78th minute of the game after head butting Mario Martinez, which led to

winning 2–1 in extra time. On 15 May 2010, in the second leg final against CD Olimpia in the Clausura, Amado Guevara had at shot at goal from outside of the area deflected by Juan Carlos García with a header that ended up in his own goal, which meant

Motagua The Motagua River () is a river in Guatemala. It rises in the western highlands of Guatemala where it is also called Río Grande, and runs in an easterly direction to the Gulf of Honduras. The final few kilometres of the river form part of the ...

won the championship with a 3–1 victory.

Wigan Athletic

On 26 July 2013, García signed a three-year contract with Wigan Athletic. He made his debut for the club on 24 September, starting in a 5–0 away defeat in a

third round match against

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. García made no further appearances that season, his only time named in the matchday squad was as a substitute was for a Championship match on 6 October, a 2–1 home win over Blackburn Rovers. On 10 August 2014 García moved to Spanish

Segunda División The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Segunda División, commercially known as LaLiga SmartBank for sponsorship reasons, is the men's second professional association football division of the Spanish football league system. Administrated by the Lig ...

side CD Tenerife, on a season-long loan. Two weeks later he was included in a matchday squad for the only time, a 1–0 defeat away to SD Ponferradina on the opening day. He returned to Wigan on 8 January 2015, after making no appearances for the club. He was released by Wigan at the end of the 2015–16 season and subsequently retired.

International career

García made his debut for

in a July

2009 CONCACAF Gold Cup The 2009 CONCACAF Gold Cup was the tenth edition of the CONCACAF Gold Cup competition, and the twentieth soccer championship of North America, Central America and the Caribbean (CONCACAF). It was played from July 3 to 26, 2009 in the United States ...

match against

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, coming on as a sub for

Carlos Palacios Carlos Palacios may refer to: * Carlos Palacios (Honduran footballer) (born 1982) * Carlos Palacios (Chilean footballer) (born 2000) {{hndis, Palacios, Carlos ...

. He also represented his country in 4

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matches and played at the

2011 UNCAF Nations Cup The 2011 Copa Centroamericana ( en, 2011 Central American Cup) was the eleventh edition of Copa Centroamericana (formerly known as the UNCAF Nations Cup), an international football championship for national teams affiliated with the Central Amer ...

, as well as at the

and

2011 CONCACAF Gold Cup The 2011 CONCACAF Gold Cup was the 11th edition of the CONCACAF Gold Cup competition, and the 21st CONCACAF regional championship overall in CONCACAF's 50 years of existence. The United States was the host nation. The competition started on June ...

s. On 3 June 2011, García was included by

Luis Fernando Suárez Luis Fernando Suárez Guzmán (born 23 December 1959) is a Colombian football manager and former player who played as a defender. He is the current manager of the Costa Rica national football team. Suárez has managed in six Latin American c ...

in Honduras' 23-man squad for the 2011 CONCACAF Gold Cup due to an injury to defender Emilio Izaguirre. On 6 February 2013, Garcia scored his lone international goal, a bicycle kick to equalise in a 2–1 home win against the United States during World Cup qualifying. It was the first time in 24 years that the United States had lost their first game of a World Cup qualification campaign. He made one appearance at the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil as Honduras exited in the group stage, replacing Izaguirre at half time in a 2–1 defeat to Ecuador in Curitiba on 21 June.

International goals

Illness and death

On 16 February 2015, it was announced that García had been diagnosed with leukaemia. He died on 8 January 2018.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Garcia, Juan Carlos 1988 births 2018 deaths People from Tela Men's association football defenders Honduran men's footballers Honduras men's international footballers 2009 CONCACAF Gold Cup players 2011 CONCACAF Gold Cup players 2013 CONCACAF Gold Cup players 2014 FIFA World Cup players C.D. Marathón players C.D. Olimpia players Liga Nacional de Fútbol Profesional de Honduras players Wigan Athletic F.C. players CD Tenerife players Honduran expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in England Expatriate men's footballers in Spain Honduran expatriate sportspeople in England Honduran expatriate sportspeople in Spain Deaths from leukemia Deaths from cancer in Honduras