Luis Gabriel Rey Villamizar (February 20, 1980) is a Colombian former professional footballer who last played for Liga MX club Monarcas Morelia on loan from Club América. A classical left-footed striker, Rey arrived to Mexico in 2001 and has scored over 150 goals in Liga MX. He holds Mexican citizenship. Nicknamed in Mexico as ''El Canguro'' (Spanish for

kangaroo Kangaroos are four marsupials from the family Macropodidae (macropods, meaning "large foot"). In common use the term is used to describe the largest species from this family, the red kangaroo, as well as the antilopine kangaroo, eastern ...

) due to his goal celebrations, he was part of the Colombia national team and played the

Copa América 2007 Copa or COPA may refer to: COPA COPA may refer to: * Computer Operator Programming Assistant. trade of ITI * Child Online Protection Act, a former U.S. law to protect minors from certain material on the internet * Canadian Owners and Pilots Asso ...

Career

Early career

Rey debuted in 2000 with

Atlético Bucaramanga Club Atlético Bucaramanga S.A., better known as Atlético Bucaramanga, is a Colombian professional football team based in Bucaramanga. The club plays its home games at the Alfonso López stadium. The club was founded on 11 May 1949 by Rafael ...

, where he remained for one year, moved to Mexico and was transferred to Segundo Division clubs such as

Lobos BUAP Club de Fútbol Lobos de la Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla were a Mexican football club based in Puebla, Mexico. The club represented the Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla. The club's history goes back to the early 193 ...

, Zitacuaro, and Acapulco; eventually he switched to

Atlante FC Atlante Fútbol Club, is a professional football club based in Mexico City, Mexico. Founded in 1916, Atlante were original members of the Mexican Primera División when it began in 1943. Atlante has won three national league championships, t ...

Atlante

While at the club, he reaped great success as goalscorer, winning the league's Gold Boot, achieved in the 2003 Apertura, becoming the first Colombian to win that distinction in Mexico soccer. In his first stint with Atlante, Rey scored 43 goals in 76 appearances.

Morelia

In 2005, Rey signed with Monarcas Morelia where he managed to score 26 goals in 88 appearances from 2005 to 2007.

Pachuca

For the Apertura 2007, Rey was purchased by recently crowned champions

Pachuca Pachuca (; ote, Nju̱nthe), formally known as Pachuca de Soto, is the capital and largest city of the Mexican state of Hidalgo. It is located in the south-central part of the state. Pachuca de Soto is also the name of the municipality of whi ...

, along with Rafael Márquez Lugo, in a trade for

Luis Angel Landin Luis is a given name. It is the Spanish form of the originally Germanic name or . Other Iberian Romance languages have comparable forms: (with an accent mark on the i) in Portuguese and Galician, in Aragonese and Catalan, while is archai ...

. Rey scored a three goals against

Tigres UANL Club de Fútbol Tigres de la Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, simply known as Tigres UANL or Tigres, is a Mexican professional football club based in San Nicolás de los Garza, a city in the Monterrey metropolitan area, Nuevo León. Found ...

. Rey returned to Atlante to play the Apertura 2008, after scoring five goals in 34 matches.

Return to Morelia

During the 2009 Draft it was announced that Rey would return to Monarcas Morelia. While in preseason with the club in

Zihuatanejo Zihuatanejo (), or Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo, is the fourth-largest city in the Mexican state of Guerrero. It was known by 18th century English mariners as Chequetan or Seguataneo. Politically the city belongs to the municipality of Zihuatanejo de Azue ...

Guerrero Guerrero is one of the 32 states that comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 81 municipalities and its capital city is Chilpancingo and its largest city is Acapulcocopied from article, GuerreroAs of 2020, Guerrero the pop ...

, Rey picked up an injury that would prevent him from playing the first match of the season. He would not reappeared until matchday six, against

Atlas An atlas is a collection of maps; it is typically a bundle of maps of Earth or of a region of Earth. Atlases have traditionally been bound into book form, but today many atlases are in multimedia formats. In addition to presenting geograp ...

and score his first goal against UANL. In November 2009 Rey would score what he considers "the best goal of his career" against

Club Deportivo Guadalajara Club Deportivo Guadalajara (); often simply known as Guadalajara () and their nickname ''Chivas'' (), is a Mexican professional football club based in Zapopan, Jalisco. Guadalajara is one of the ten founding members of the Mexican First Divisi ...

at the

Estadio Morelos Estadio Morelos is a football stadium located along Periférico Independencia, in the Independencia sector, near the base of Cerro del Quinceo in northwest Morelia, Michoacán, México. It was the site of professional football teams, Monarcas M ...

. After a cross from teammate Jaime Duran, Rey attempted a successful bicycle-kick which beat goalkeeper Luis Ernesto Michel.

Jaguares de Chiapas

For the Apertura 2011, Rey was transferred to

Jaguares de Chiapas Chiapas Fútbol Club, commonly known as Jaguares de Chiapas, was a football club based in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Mexico, that played in the Mexican football league system Liga MX. The team played their home matches at the Estadio Víctor Manuel Re ...

, club in which he scored his 100th goal in the Mexican top-flight in the first match of the tournament against Monterrey. Appearing in over 70 matches and scoring 33 goals, Rey is one of the top goal-scorers in the club's history.

América

On June 5, 2013, Rey was signed by recently crowned league champions América. He scored his first goal for América on September 2 in the 4–1 win over

UNAM The National Autonomous University of Mexico ( es, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, UNAM) is a public research university in Mexico. It is consistently ranked as one of the best universities in Latin America, where it's also the bigge ...

. On 2015, Rey moved to

Puebla FC Puebla ( en, colony, settlement), officially Free and Sovereign State of Puebla ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Puebla), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 217 municipalities and its cap ...

Puebla

Puebla signed Rey in a season-long loan deal from Club América. Rey played a total of 38 games between Liga MX and the

Copa MX The Copa MX (formerly called Copa Tower Monterrey, Copa Eliminatoria, Copa México and Copa Corona MX (for sponsorship reasons)) was a Mexican football cup competition that was established in 1907. After a lengthy hiatus that began in 1997, it wa ...

, having scored a total of 11 goals in both competitions. At the end of the Apertura 2015 he returned with Club América.

Back on loan to Monarcas Morelia

On 9 December 2015, Monarcas Morelia announced that they had reached an agreement with Club América for the loan of Luis Gabriel Rey.

International Goals

Honors

Club

;Pachuca *

North American SuperLiga The SuperLiga was an official North American association football competition between teams from the Liga MX of Mexico and Major League Soccer of the United States and Canada, the top divisions in each country. The competition was sanctioned by C ...

: 2007 * CONCACAF Champions' Cup:

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

;Atlante * CONCACAF Champions League: 2008–09 ;Morelia *

: 2010 ;América * Liga MX: Apertura 2014 ;Puebla *

: Clausura 2015 *

Supercopa MX The Supercopa MX ( en, Supercup MX) was a Mexican football championship contested by the winners of the Apertura and Clausura Copa MX. History In June 2013 Liga MX president Decio De María announced the winners of Apertura and Clausura Copa MX w ...

: 2015

Individual

* Mexican Primera División top scorer: Apertura 2003

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Rey, Luis Gabriel 1980 births Living people People from Bucaramanga Colombian footballers Colombia international footballers Colombian emigrants to Mexico Naturalized citizens of Mexico Atlético Bucaramanga footballers Lobos BUAP footballers Atlante F.C. footballers Atlético Morelia players C.F. Pachuca players Chiapas F.C. footballers Club Puebla players Club América footballers 2007 Copa América players Liga MX players Colombian expatriate footballers Expatriate footballers in Mexico Association football forwards Sportspeople from Santander Department