Paolo Fernandes Cantin (born 19 August 1998) is a Spanish 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 ...

who plays for

Greek Super League The Super League Greece 1 ( el, Ελληνική Σούπερ Λιγκ 1), or Super League 1, is the highest professional association football league in Greece. The league was formed on 16 July 2006 and replaced ''Alpha Ethniki'' at the top of ...

club

AEK Athens A.E.K ( el, AEK , formally Αθλητική Ένωσις Κωνσταντινουπόλεως; Athlitikí Énosis Konstantinoupόleos, ''Athletic Union of Constantinople''), known as A.E.K, is a major Greek multi-sport club based in Nea Filadel ...

. Mainly a

left winger A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

, he also plays as an

attacking midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

Club career

Manchester City

Born in

Zaragoza Zaragoza, also known in English as Saragossa,''Encyclopædia Britannica'"Zaragoza (conventional Saragossa)" is the capital city of the Zaragoza Province and of the autonomous community of Aragon, Spain. It lies by the Ebro river and its tributari ...

, Aragon to a Capeverdean father, Fernandes started his career at

Real Zaragoza Real Zaragoza, S.A.D. (), commonly referred to as Zaragoza, is a football club based in Zaragoza, Aragon, Spain, that currently competes in the Segunda División, the second tier of the Spanish league system. Zaragoza holds its home games at L ...

. In 2013, aged 15, he joined Manchester City after being invited to train for the squad. Zaragoza later claimed to the Royal Spanish Football Federation that the player was not allowed to join City, and the English club agreed to pay a compensation fee for the move (rumoured to be

€ The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone and unilaterally adopted by Kosovo and Montenegro. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists ...

180,000); despite still training at City, he was only registered in August 2014 when he reached the age of 16. Initially assigned to the under-18 squad, Fernandes progressed through the EDS and represented the under-21s and under-23s. With the latter side he scored 11 goals in 22 appearances in the 2016–17 Premier League 2 Division 1.

Loan to NAC Breda

On 24 June 2017, after finishing his formation, Fernandes,

Thierry Ambrose Thierry Winston Jordan Ambrose (born 28 March 1997) is a professional footballer who plays as a forward for KV Oostende. A former youth international for France, he plays for the Guadeloupe national team. International career Ambrose was born ...

and fellow compatriot Pablo Marí were loaned to

Eredivisie The Eredivisie (; ''"Honour Division"'' or ''"Premier Division"'') is the highest level of professional football in the Netherlands. The league was founded in 1956, two years after the start of professional football in the Netherlands. It is c ...

side Breda. He made his professional debut on 12 August, coming on as a half-time substitute for Giovanni Korte in a 1–4 away loss against Vitesse. Fernandes scored his first professional goal on 3 December 2017, netting his team's third in a 3–1 home win against

Excelsior Excelsior, a Latin comparative word often translated as "ever upward" or "even higher", may refer to: Arts and entertainment Literature and poetry * "Excelsior" (Longfellow), an 1841 poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow * ''Excelsior'' (Macedo ...

. The following 12 July, his loan was extended for a further

season A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and ...

, but only contributed with eight league appearances.

Loan to Perugia

On 17 July 2019, Fernandes joined Italian

Serie B The Serie B (), currently named Serie BKT for sponsorship reasons, is the second-highest division in the Italian football league system after the Serie A. It has been operating for over ninety years since the 1929–30 season. It had been ...

side

Perugia Perugia (, , ; lat, Perusia) is the capital city of Umbria in central Italy, crossed by the River Tiber, and of the province of Perugia. The city is located about north of Rome and southeast of Florence. It covers a high hilltop and pa ...

on loan for the 2019–20 season. He appeared in 16 league matches overall, totalling ten starts.

Castellón

Fernandes joined Segunda División newcomers Castellón on 3 September 2020, signing a three-year contract.

Volos

On 29 June 2021, he was announced from the

club

Volos Volos ( el, Βόλος ) is a coastal port city in Thessaly situated midway on the Greek mainland, about north of Athens and south of Thessaloniki. It is the sixth most populous city of Greece, and the capital of the Magnesia regional unit ...

as their newest addition, their 7th transfer for the upcoming season, until now, with a brief announcement that does not disclose the duration of the contract signed. On 19 September 2021, he scored his first goal in a 3–1 away win against Apollon Smyrnis.

AEK Athens

On 15 September 2022, Fernandes signed a four-year contract with

club

. The player will join the club permanently on 1 January 2023.

Career statistics

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Fernandes, Paolo 1998 births Living people Footballers from Zaragoza Spanish people of Cape Verdean descent Association football wingers Association football midfielders Spanish footballers Segunda División players CD Castellón footballers Manchester City F.C. players Eredivisie players NAC Breda players Volos N.F.C. players AEK Athens F.C. players Super League Greece players Serie B players A.C. Perugia Calcio players Spanish expatriate footballers Spanish expatriate sportspeople in England Spanish expatriate sportspeople in the Netherlands Spanish expatriate sportspeople in Italy Spanish expatriate sportspeople in Greece Expatriate footballers in England Expatriate footballers in the Netherlands Expatriate footballers in Italy Expatriate footballers in Greece