Unai López Cabrera (; ; born 30 October 1995) 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 le ...

who plays for Rayo Vallecano as a

central 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

Born in

Errenteria Errenteria ( eu, Errenteria/Orereta, es, Rentería) is a town located in the province of Gipuzkoa in the Basque Autonomous Community, in the north of Spain, near the French border. The river Oiartzun cuts its way through the town, one that has ...

Gipuzkoa Gipuzkoa (, , ; es, Guipúzcoa ; french: Guipuscoa) is a province of Spain and a historical territory of the autonomous community of the Basque Country. Its capital city is Donostia-San Sebastián. Gipuzkoa shares borders with the French depa ...

, López joined

Athletic Bilbao Athletic Club ( eu, Bilboko Athletic Kluba; es, Athletic Club de Bilbao), commonly known as Athletic Bilbao or just Athletic, is a professional Association football, football club based in the city of Bilbao in the Basque Country (autonomous com ...

's youth system in 2011 at the age of 14 from neighbouring

Real Sociedad Real Sociedad de Fútbol, S.A.D., more commonly referred to as Real Sociedad (; ''Royal Society''), La Real in Spanish, Erreala in Basque, is a Spanish professional sports club in the city of San Sebastián, Basque Country, founded on 7 Septem ...

, after starting out at

Antiguoko Antiguoko Kirol Elkartea (Sport Club of Antiguo in English) is an amateur youth Spanish football club based in Antiguo, a part of San Sebastián, in the Basque Country, Spain. It acts as feeder club to Athletic Bilbao, having previously had the ...

. He made his debut as a senior with the farm team in the 2012–13 season in

Tercera División Tercera División ( en, Third Division) was the fourth tier of the Spanish football league system. Founded in 1929, it was below the ''Primera División'' (also known as La Liga), the ''Segunda División'', and the semi-professional ''Segunda Di ...

, and in June 2013 was promoted to the reserves in

Segunda División B Segunda División B ( en, Second Division B) was the third tier of the Spanish football league system containing 102 teams divided into five groups, until it was replaced by the new structure in 2021. It was administered by the Royal Spanish Foot ...

. López was called up to the main squad by manager Ernesto Valverde on 2 July 2014, for pre-season matches. In August he was also added in the B list for the campaign's

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competit ...

, being awarded the number 29 jersey. On 27 August 2014, López was named on the bench for the Champions League play-off match against

S.S.C. Napoli Società Sportiva Calcio Napoli, commonly referred to as Napoli (), is an Italian professional football club based in the city of Naples ( it, Napoli, nap, Napule), Campania that plays in Serie A, the top flight of Italian football. Napoli ha ...

. He made his first-team debut the following day, coming on as a substitute for

Markel Susaeta Markel Susaeta Laskurain (, ; born 14 December 1987) is a Spanish former footballer who played as a right winger. He spent almost the entirety of his professional career with Athletic Bilbao after making his debut with the first team in 2007, ...

in the 72nd minute of a 3–1 home win and also providing an

assist Assist or ASSIST may refer to: Sports Several sports have a statistic known as an "assist", generally relating to action by a player leading to a score by another player on their team: *Assist (basketball), a pass by a player that facilitates a ba ...

Ibai Gómez Ibai Gómez Pérez (born 11 November 1989) is a Spanish former professional footballer who played mainly as a left winger. He achieved La Liga totals of 226 games and 28 goals over 11 seasons, with Athletic Bilbao (two spells) and Alavés. He ...

in the last goal. His

La Liga The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Primera División, commonly known simply as Primera División in Spain, and as La Liga in English-speaking countries and officially as LaLiga Santander for sponsorship reasons, stylized as LaLiga, is the men's ...

bow took place on the 30th, when he featured 23 minutes in the 3–0 defeat of

Levante UD Levante Unión Deportiva, S.A.D. (, ca-valencia, Llevant Unió Esportiva ) is a List of football clubs in Spain, Spanish football club in Valencia, in the Valencian Community, namesake autonomous community. Founded on 9 September 1909, Levante ...

also at the San Mamés Stadium. On 26 July 2016, after a season back at the B side in

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 ...

, López was loaned to

CD Leganés Club Deportivo Leganés, S.A.D. is a football club based in Leganés, Community of Madrid, Spain, that currently competes in Segunda División, the second tier of the Spanish league system. It was founded on 23 June 1928. It holds home games at ...

for one year. On 1 August of the following year, he moved to second tier club Rayo Vallecano on a one-year loan deal. López scored his first competitive goal for Athletic on 8 March 2020, from a free kick to open a 4–1 away league victory over

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 colo ...

. He featured regularly during the 2019–20 campaign, but subsequently fell down the pecking order after the emergence of newer youth prospects such as

Oihan Sancet Oihan Sancet Tirapu (born 25 April 2000) is a Spanish professional association football, footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder for La Liga club Athletic Bilbao and the Spain national football team, Spain national team. Club career Bor ...

Unai Vencedor Unai Vencedor Paris (born 15 November 2000) is a Spanish professional association football, footballer who plays as a midfielder for Racing de Santander, on loan from Athletic Bilbao. Club career Born in Bilbao, Biscay, Basque Country (autonomo ...

and Oier Zarraga. On 31 August 2021, López returned to Rayo on a three-year contract; Athletic retained a first refusal clause on any future transfer, while also receiving "a series of economic compensations".

Career statistics

Honours

Rayo Vallecano *

: 2017–18 Athletic Bilbao *

Copa del Rey The Campeonato de España–Copa de Su Majestad el Rey, commonly known as Copa del Rey or simply La Copa and formerly known as Copa del Presidente de la República (1932–36) and Copa del Generalísimo (1939–76), is an annual knockout footbal ...

runner-up: 2019–20,

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lopez, Unai 1995 births Living people People from Errenteria Sportspeople from Gipuzkoa Spanish footballers Footballers from the Basque Country (autonomous community) Men's association football midfielders La Liga players Segunda División players Segunda División B players Tercera División players Antiguoko players CD Basconia footballers Athletic Bilbao B footballers Athletic Bilbao footballers CD Leganés players Rayo Vallecano players Spain men's youth international footballers Spain men's under-21 international footballers