Valentín Vada (; born 6 March 1996) is an Argentine 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 as a

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 ...

for Spanish club

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 La ...

Career

Vada’s move to France was controversial. In 2010 at the age of 14 as a minor, his arrival from a non-EU country was against the laws governing the movement of underage players. Italian heritage ameliorated those concerns eventually, but Vada was unable to play in any competitive matches, even for the “B” team until he turned 17. Vada made his

Ligue 1 Ligue 1, officially known as Ligue 1 Uber Eats for sponsorship reasons, is a French professional league for men's association football clubs. At the top of the French football league system, it is the country's primary football competition. A ...

debut on 13 December 2015 against Angers SCO replacing

Nicolas Maurice-Belay Nicolas Maurice-Belay (born 19 April 1985) is French former professional footballer who played as a midfielder. He spent most of his career with FC Sochaux-Montbéliard and FC Girondins de Bordeaux. Career Maurice-Belay was born in Sucy-en-Brie ...

after 79 minutes. He scored his first professional goals on 8 April 2017, netting a brace in a 3–0 home defeat of

FC Metz Football Club de Metz, commonly referred to as FC Metz or simply Metz (), is a French association football club based in Metz, Lorraine. The club was formed in 1932 and plays in Ligue 2, the second division in the French football league sys ...

. On 31 January 2019, the last day of the 2018–19 winter transfer window, Vada joined Bordeaux's league rivals

AS Saint-Étienne Association Sportive de Saint-Étienne Loire (), commonly known as A.S.S.E. () or simply Saint-Étienne, is a professional football club based in Saint-Étienne in Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, France. The club was founded in 1933 and competes in ...

on loan until the end of the season. On 23 August, he agreed to a five-year contract with

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

UD Almería Unión Deportiva Almería, S.A.D. () is a Spanish professional football club based in Almería, in the autonomous community of Andalusia. Founded on 26 July 1989 and known as ''Almería Club de Fútbol'' until 2001, when it was renamed ''Unión D ...

. On 4 October 2020, despite being a regular starter for the

Andalusia Andalusia (, ; es, Andalucía ) is the southernmost Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community in Peninsular Spain. It is the most populous and the second-largest autonomous community in the country. It is officially recognised as a ...

ns, Vada was loaned to fellow second division side CD Tenerife for the 2020–21 season. On 31 August 2021, he terminated his contract with Almería, and signed a two-year deal with

in the same category just hours later.

Career statistics

Notes

References

External links

* 1996 births Living people Men's association football midfielders Argentine footballers Argentine people of Italian descent Ligue 1 players Championnat National 2 players FC Girondins de Bordeaux players AS Saint-Étienne players Segunda División players UD Almería players CD Tenerife players Real Zaragoza players Argentine expatriate footballers Argentine expatriate sportspeople in France Argentine expatriate sportspeople in Spain Expatriate footballers in France Expatriate footballers in Spain Footballers from Santa Fe, Argentina {{Argentina-footy-midfielder-1990s-stub