Roberto Júnior Fernández Torres (born 29 March 1988), better known as Gatito Fernández, is a Paraguayan 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 lea ...

who plays as a

goalkeeper In many team sports that involve scoring goal (sport), goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie, or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or i ...

for

Paraguayan Primera División The División Profesional de la Paraguayan Football Association, Asociación Paraguaya de Fútbol (; "Professional Division of the Paraguayan Football Association"), also known as the Primera División (; "first division"), or due to sponsorship ...

club

Cerro Porteño Club Cerro Porteño is a professional Paraguayan Association football, football club, based in the neighbourhood of Obrero (Asunción), Obrero in Asunción. Founded in 1912, Cerro has won 34 Paraguayan Primera División, Primera División titles ...

and the Paraguay national team. He is known as ''Gatito'' () for being the son of former Paraguayan 1986 World Cup goalkeeper Roberto Fernández, nicknamed ''Gato'' (). Because of his father, who was a goalkeeper at Brazilian clubs, such as Internacional and

Palmeiras The Sociedade Esportiva Palmeiras (), commonly known as Palmeiras, is a Brazilian professional association football, football club based in the city of São Paulo, in the district of Perdizes (district of São Paulo), Perdizes. Palmeiras is ...

, Gatito had lived in Brazil before his professional days.

Club career

Early career

Fernández started his professional career with

club

in 2007. He became Paraguayan champion with the club in the 2009 Apertura. Following the achievement, he joined

Argentine Primera División The Primera División (; ), known officially as Liga Profesional de Fútbol, or Torneo Betano for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Argentina and the highest level of the Argentine football league system. Organ ...

side

Estudiantes de La Plata ( lit. "La Plata Students"), simply referred to as Estudiantes de La Plata, is an Argentine professional sports club based in La Plata. The club's football team currently competes in the Primera División, where it has spent most of its histo ...

. After a season in the club without any first team appearance, he joined

Racing In sports, racing is a competition of speed, in which competitors try to complete a given task in the shortest amount of time. Typically this involves traversing some distance, but it can be any other task involving speed to reach a specific g ...

. In August 2011,

FC Utrecht Football Club Utrecht () is a Dutch professional association football, football club based in Utrecht. The club competes in the Eredivisie, the top tier of Dutch football league system, Dutch football, and plays its home matches at the Stadion ...

announced the signing of Fernández on loan for one year to cover a possible departure of Michel Vorm.

Botafogo

On 26 November 2016, Fernandéz signed with

Botafogo Botafogo (local/standard alternative Brazilian Portuguese pronunciation: ) is a beachfront neighborhood (''bairro'') in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It is a mostly upper middle class and small commerce community, and is located between the hills of M ...

on a two-year contract until December 2018, moving on a free transfer. On 9 April 2018, after good performances in the

2017 Copa Libertadores The 2017 Copa CONMEBOL Libertadores (officially the Copa CONMEBOL Libertadores Bridgestone 2017 for sponsorship reasons) was the 58th edition of the CONMEBOL Libertadores (also referred to as the ''Copa Libertadores''), South America's premier c ...

and

2018 Campeonato Carioca The 2018 Campeonato Carioca de Futebol was the 115th edition of the top tier of football of FFERJ (Federação de Futebol do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, or Rio de Janeiro State Football Federation). The top four teams in the final standings of th ...

, Botafogo extended contract with Fernandéz until December 2021. On 6 October 2022, he became the foreign player with the most appearances for Botafogo, surpassing his teammate Joel Carli with 188 games. On 2 February 2023, Fernández signed a contract renewal until the end of 2024 with Botafogo. On 19 July, Fernández returned to play for Botafogo in a 1–1 draw against the Argentine team Patronato, a game valid for the Copa Sudamericana. The game marked ''Gatitos return after eight months without playing. Although the goalkeeper had been fully recovered for months from the injury suffered in a game against Atlético Minero at the end of the previous year, his return to the field took a while to happen due to the good performances of his teammate Lucas Perri, who ended up taking over as the starting goalkeeper for Botafogo. At the end of the season his contract was not renewed, so during his time at the Rio de Janeiro club, he played 222 matches, becoming the fifth goalkeeper with the most games in Botafogo's history.

International career

Fernández debuted with the Paraguay U20 national team in the

2007 South American Youth Championship The 2007 South American Youth Championship (Sudamericano Sub-20) was the 23rd edition of the competition. It was played in Paraguay between 7 and 28 January 2007, and was contested by all ten U-20 national football teams of CONMEBOL. This was the ...

replacing the injured

Blas Hermosilla Blas is mainly a Spanish given name and surname, related to Blaise. It may refer to Places *Piz Blas, mountain in Switzerland * San Blas (disambiguation) People * Ricardo Blas Jr. (born 1986) Judo athlete from Guam * Blas Antonio Sáenz (fl. 184 ...

. He was selected for the Paraguay senior squad for the

2011 Copa América The 2011 Campeonato Sudamericano Copa América, better known as the 2011 Copa América or the Copa América 2011 Argentina, was the 43rd edition of the Copa América, the main international association football, football tournament for national ...

, remaining an unused substitute as the team finished the tournament as the runner-up.

Career statistics

Club

International

Honours

Cerro Porteño *

2009 2009 was designated as the International Year of Astronomy by the United Nations to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei's first known astronomical studies with a telescope and the publication of Astronomia Nova by Joha ...

Estudiantes de la Plata *

FIFA Club World Cup The FIFA Club World Cup (FIFA CWC) is an international men's association football competition organised by the ''Fédération Internationale de Football Association'' (FIFA), the sport's global sports governing body, governing body. The compe ...

runner-up:

Botafogo *

Copa Libertadores The CONMEBOL Libertadores, also known as Copa Libertadores de América (), is an annual continental club football competition organized by CONMEBOL since 1960. It is the highest level of competition in South American club football. The tournam ...

2024 The year saw the list of ongoing armed conflicts, continuation of major armed conflicts, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Myanmar civil war (2021–present), Myanmar civil war, the Sudanese civil war (2023–present), Sudane ...

Campeonato Brasileiro Série A The Campeonato Brasileiro Série A (; English: "Brazilian Championship A Series"), commonly referred to as the Brasileirão (; English: "Big Brazilian" or "Great Brazilian"), the Série A or the Brazilian Série A (to distinguish it from the I ...

Campeonato Carioca The Campeonato Carioca (Carioca Championship), officially known as Campeonato Estadual do Rio de Janeiro (Rio de Janeiro State Championship), also commonly known as the Cariocão, is the top-flight professional state football league in the Br ...

2018 Events January * January 1 – Bulgaria takes over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, after the Estonian presidency. * January 4 – SPLM-IO rebels loyal to Chan Garang Lual start a raid against Juba, capital of ...

Campeonato Brasileiro Série B The Campeonato Brasileiro Série B (commonly referred to as the Brasileirão Série B, the Série B or the Brazilian Série B to distinguish it from the Italian and the Ecuadorian Serie B), and currently officially called Brasileirão Série B ...

2021 Like the year 2020, 2021 was also heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, due to the emergence of multiple Variants of SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 variants. The major global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, which began at the end of 2020, continued ...

Taça Rio Taça Rio ( English: Rio Cup) is an annual football tournament attached to Campeonato Carioca, the state football league in the Rio de Janeiro state. It has been organized since 1982 by the Rio de Janeiro State Football Federation. It has had ...

: 2023, 2024 Paraguay *

Copa América The CONMEBOL Copa América (; known until 1975 as the South American Football Championship), often simply called the Copa America, is the top men's quadrennial association football, football tournament contested among list of men's national ass ...

runner-up:

2011 The year marked the start of a Arab Spring, series of protests and revolutions throughout the Arab world advocating for democracy, reform, and economic recovery, later leading to the depositions of world leaders in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen ...

Individual *

Copa do Brasil The Copa do Brasil () is a knockout football competition played by 92 teams, representing all 26 Brazilian states plus the Federal District. It is the Brazilian domestic cup and it is the Brazilian equivalent of the FA Cup, Taça de Portugal, ...

Best Goalkeeper:

2017 2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly. Events January * January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...

*Troféu EFE Brasil: 2017
- UOL

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Fernandez, Gatito 1988 births Living people Footballers from Asunción Paraguayan men's footballers Men's association football goalkeepers Paraguayan expatriate men's footballers Paraguayan Primera División players Argentine Primera División players Eredivisie players Campeonato Brasileiro Série A players Campeonato Brasileiro Série B players Cerro Porteño players Estudiantes de La Plata footballers Racing Club de Avellaneda footballers FC Utrecht players Esporte Clube Vitória players Figueirense FC players Botafogo de Futebol e Regatas players 2011 Copa América players 2019 Copa América players Paraguay men's under-20 international footballers Paraguay men's international footballers Paraguayan expatriate sportspeople in Argentina Paraguayan expatriate sportspeople in Brazil Expatriate men's footballers in Argentina Expatriate men's footballers in the Netherlands Expatriate men's footballers in Brazil Paraguayan people of Italian descent Paraguayan people of Spanish descent Footballers at the 2024 Summer Olympics Olympic footballers for Paraguay Copa Libertadores–winning players 21st-century Paraguayan sportsmen