Jürgen Macho (born 24 August 1977) is an

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

n retired

football goalkeeper Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly ca ...

. He is the goalkeeper coach of

Rapid Wien Sportklub Rapid Wien (), commonly known as Rapid Vienna, is an Austrian football club playing in the country's capital city of Vienna. Rapid has won the most Austrian championship titles (32), including the first title in the season 1911–12, ...

Club career

Macho started his first-team career with

Wiener Sport-Club The Wiener Sport-Club, sometimes abbreviated as WSC, was established in 1883 in Vienna, Austria and is one of the country's oldest athletics clubs. Their traditional home is in the Dornbach quarter of the city ( 17th district). History At vari ...

in 1996, and moved after one season to

First Vienna FC First Vienna FC is an Austrian association football club based in the Döbling district of Vienna. Established on 22 August 1894, it is the country's oldest team and has played a notable role in the history of the game there. It is familiarly k ...

, where he spent three seasons before leaving for

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 ...

club

Sunderland Sunderland () is a port city in Tyne and Wear, England. It is the City of Sunderland's administrative centre and in the Historic counties of England, historic county of County of Durham, Durham. The city is from Newcastle-upon-Tyne and is on t ...

in 2000. At Sunderland, Macho spent three seasons as the second-choice keeper, behind Danish international

Thomas Sørensen Thomas Løvendahl Sørensen (born 12 June 1976) is a retired Danish Association football, footballer who played as a Goalkeeper (association football), goalkeeper. Sørensen started his career with his local side Odense Boldklub, Odense BK. Af ...

, and managed a total of 22 league appearances. He then transferred to

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

for the 2003–04 season, but was mostly fourth-choice there. He suffered a serious season-long injury, and subsequently failed to make a single competitive appearance with the team. In August 2004, having been released from the remaining year of his Chelsea contract, Macho left the club to join

Austrian Bundesliga The Austrian Football Bundesliga (german: Österreichische Fußball-Bundesliga, italic=no , "Austrian Football Federal League"), also known as Admiral Bundesliga for sponsorship reasons, is the top level of the Austrian football league system. Th ...

side

SK Rapid Wien Sportklub Rapid Wien (), commonly known as Rapid Vienna, is an Austrian football club playing in the country's capital city of Vienna. Rapid has won the most Austrian championship titles (32), including the first title in the season 1911–12, ...

, on what was scheduled to be a year-long loan deal. However, he spent just four months there, managing eight league appearances, as well as two in the

UEFA Cup A cup is an open-top used to hold hot or cold liquids for pouring or drinking; while mainly used for drinking, it also can be used to store Solid, solids for pouring (e.g., sugar, flour, grains, salt). Cups may be made of glass, metal, porcela ...

. In January 2005, Macho joined Germany's 1. FC Kaiserslautern, where he first spent six months as the third-choice, behind

Tim Wiese Tim Wiese (; born 17 December 1981) is a German former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. Having progressed through the youth teams at DJK Dürscheid and Bayer Leverkusen, Wiese started his professional career at Fortuna Köln, ...

and

Thomas Ernst Thomas Ernst (born 23 December 1967) is a German former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. Career Ernst was born in Wiesbaden, Hesse. He started playing professionally with Eintracht Frankfurt. At the Hessian club, he could o ...

. However, he managed to become the starter in 2005–06, as Wiese left for

SV Werder Bremen Sportverein Werder Bremen von 1899 e. V. (), commonly known as Werder Bremen (), Werder or simply Bremen, is a German professional sports club based in Bremen, Bremen (state), Free Hanseatic City of Bremen. Founded on 4 February 1899, they are be ...

. He subsequently made a total of 20 league appearances that season, but missed nearly the entire second part of the season due to an injury. He continued to be Kaiserslautern's main goalkeeper during 2006–07, with the team now in the

second division In sport, the Second Division, also called Division 2 or Division II is usually the second highest division of a league, and will often have promotion and relegation with divisions above and below. Following the rise of Premier League style compet ...

, to where it was relegated after finishing 16th in the topflight the previous season. On 31 August 2007, Macho joined

AEK Athens F.C. AEK FC ( el, ΠΑΕ A.E.K. ; Αθλητική Ένωσις Κωνσταντινουπόλεως; ''Athlitikí Énosis Konstantinoupόleos'', meaning ''Athletic Union of Constantinople'') is a Greek professional football club based in Nea Filade ...

in Greece. He was soon selected as the team's first-choice goalkeeper, ahead of

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 ...

ian Marcelo Moretto. On 26 March 2009, it was announced he would be released from contract after it expired in June. Macho was in training with Premier League's

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 view to a permanent move, but the transfer was cancelled on 29 September 2009. On 5 November 2009, after a few months without a club, Macho returned to his country after five years, signing with

LASK Linz Linzer Athletik-Sport-Klub, commonly known as Linzer ASK () or simply LASK, is an Austrian professional football club, from the Upper-Austrian state capital Linz. It is the oldest football club in that region, and plays in the Austrian Football ...

. At the end of the season, however, he moved to Greece again, joining

Panionios GSS Panionios G.S.S. (Greek: Πανιώνιος Γυμναστικός Σύλλογος Σμύρνης, ''Panionios Gymnastikos Syllogos Smyrnis''), the ''Pan- Ionian Gymnastics Club of Smyrna'', is a Greek multi-sport club founded in 1890. Originally ...

International career

Macho made his debut for

in 2002, going on to amass 26 internationals, including two

2006 FIFA World Cup The 2006 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Germany 2006, was the 18th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which had won the right to host the ...

qualifiers in October 2005. On 16 November 2007, in a friendly against

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, he swallowed his tongue after a collision with

Peter Crouch Peter James Crouch (born 30 January 1981) is an English former professional footballer who played as a striker. He was capped 42 times by the England national team between 2005 and 2010, scoring 22 goals for his country during that time, and ...

. His life was saved by Austria's chief medic. In

UEFA Euro 2008 The 2008 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as UEFA Euro 2008 or simply Euro 2008, was the 13th UEFA European Championship, a quadrennial football tournament contested by the member nations of UEFA (the Union of European ...

, Macho played all three group stage matches for the hosts, in an eventual group stage exit.

Honours

: ** Austrian League: 2004–05

References

External links

*
Rapid Wien archives
* *
Jürgen Macho
at Footballdatabase {{DEFAULTSORT:Macho, Jurgen 1977 births Living people Footballers from Vienna Austrian footballers Association football goalkeepers Austrian Football Bundesliga players First Vienna FC players SK Rapid Wien players LASK players Premier League players Sunderland A.F.C. players Chelsea F.C. players Bundesliga players 2. Bundesliga players 1. FC Kaiserslautern players Super League Greece players AEK Athens F.C. players Panionios F.C. players FC Admira Wacker Mödling players Austria international footballers UEFA Euro 2008 players Austrian expatriate footballers Expatriate footballers in England Expatriate footballers in Germany Expatriate footballers in Greece Wiener Sport-Club players Austrian expatriate sportspeople in England Austrian expatriate sportspeople in Greece Austrian expatriate sportspeople in Germany