Rolando David Zárate Riga (born 6 August 1978) is an Argentine former 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 played as a

centre forward In the sport of association football, a forward (attacker or striker) is an outfield position which primarily plays further up the pitch than midfielders and defenders. As with any attacking player, the role of the forward relies heavily on be ...

, and is a

sports agent A sports agent is a legal representative (hence agent (law), agent) for professional sports figures such as athletes and coaches. They procure and negotiate employment and Testimonial, endorsement contracts for the principal (commercial law), at ...

Club career

Born in Haedo, Buenos Aires Province, Zárate spent most of his career for

Club Atlético Vélez Sarsfield Club Atlético Vélez Sarsfield () is an Argentine sports club based in Liniers, Buenos Aires. Its football team plays in Argentine Primera División, Primera División, the highest level of the Argentine football league system, Argentine league ...

, representing the club in two different spells. He made his professional debut in 1997, playing in only 17 Primera División games in his first two seasons combined. Zárate moved to Spain in 1998, going on to remain in that country for the following four years, always on loan: he started out at

Terrassa FC Terrassa Futbol Club is a Spanish football team based in Terrassa, Barcelona, in the autonomous community of Catalonia. Founded in 1906, it currently plays in , holding home matches at '' Estadi Olímpic de Terrassa'', with a capacity of 7,500 sp ...

in the third division, joining

Real Madrid Castilla Real Madrid Castilla Club de Fútbol is a Spanish football team that plays in . It is Real Madrid's reserve team. They play their home games at the Alfredo Di Stéfano Stadium with a capacity of 6,000 seats. Reserve teams in Spain play in the ...

in the same level the following year. His impressive scoring form prompted

Real Madrid Real Madrid Club de Fútbol (), commonly referred to as Real Madrid, is a Spanish professional Football club (association football), football club based in Madrid. The club competes in La Liga, th ...

boss

Vicente del Bosque Vicente del Bosque González, 1st Marquess of Del Bosque (; born 23 December 1950) is a Spanish retired football manager and former player. He is regarded as one of the greatest managers of all time and is to date the only football manager to ha ...

to promote him to the main squad, and he scored three official goals for them (one in

La Liga The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Primera División, commonly known as the Primera División or La Liga, and officially known as LaLiga EA Sports for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Spain and the highest ...

and two in the

Copa del Rey The , commonly known as , or (in English) the Spanish Cup or King's Cup, and formerly known as Copa del Presidente de la República (1932–1936) and Copa del Generalísimo (1939–1976), is an annual knockout football competition in Spanis ...

); between 2001 and 2002 he represented

Ciudad de Murcia Club de Fútbol Ciudad de Murcia, usually abbreviated to Ciudad de Murcia, was a Spanish football club based in Murcia, in the namesake autonomous community. They played at the 16,000-seater ''Estadio de La Condomina''. Ciudad Murcia was reloc ...

and its neighbours

Real Murcia Real Murcia Club de Fútbol, S.A.D., commonly known as Real Murcia (, "Royal Murcia"), is a Spanish football club based in Murcia, in the Región de Murcia. Founded in 1919, it currently plays in , playing home matches at Estadio Nueva Condo ...

, respectively in divisions three and

two 2 (two) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 1 and preceding 3. It is the smallest and the only even prime number. Because it forms the basis of a duality, it has religious and spiritual significance in many ...

. Zárate played with Livingston in the 2002–03 season, still owned by Vélez. He netted twice on his debut in the

Scottish Premier League The Scottish Premier League (SPL) was the Scottish football league system, top-level league competition for professional Association football, football clubs in Scotland. The league was founded in 1998, when it broke away from the Scottish Foo ...

, a 3–2 home win against

Motherwell Motherwell (, ) is a List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, town and former burgh in North Lanarkshire, Scotland, United Kingdom, south east of Glasgow. It has a population of around 32,120. Shires of Scotland, Historically in the p ...

, and eventually proved instrumental as the ''Livi Lions'' retained their division status. Zárate's last loan would be with

Ittihad FC Al-Ittihad Club (), commonly known as Al-Ittihad or simply Ittihad, is a Saudi professional football club based in Jeddah. It was founded in 1927. The club has spent its entire history in the top flight of football in Saudi Arabia, currently know ...

in Saudi Arabia. Again with Vélez, he scored 13 times in the 2004 Clausura Tournament, adding eight in the following year's Apertura. In the subsequent

Clausura The ' () and ' () tournaments is a split season format for Spanish-speaking sports leagues. It is a relatively recent innovation for many Latin American football leagues in which the traditional association football season from August to May is ...

, ''Roly'' netted seven goals as his team won the national championship for the first time in seven years. In the following years, Zárate played in Mexico for two teams, also representing

Club Atlético River Plate Club Atlético River Plate is an Argentine professional sports club based in the Belgrano, Buenos Aires, Belgrano neighborhood of Buenos Aires. Founded in 1901, the club is named after the English name for the city's estuary, Río de la Plata. ...

without any impact. On 25 July 2009, he re-signed with Vélez on a free transfer after a period of trial, from Ecuador's

Barcelona Sporting Club Barcelona Sporting Club (), internationally known as Barcelona de Guayaquil, is an Ecuadorian sports club based in Guayaquil, known best for its professional football team. They currently play in the Ecuadorian Serie A, the highest level of ...

, but was released during that year due to injury to his

spinal cord The spinal cord is a long, thin, tubular structure made up of nervous tissue that extends from the medulla oblongata in the lower brainstem to the lumbar region of the vertebral column (backbone) of vertebrate animals. The center of the spinal c ...

; he returned to training in early 2010 and, eventually, signed a new one-year deal. For

2010–11 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...

, 32-year-old Zárate joined

Club Atlético Huracán Club Atlético Huracán () is an Argentine sports club from the Parque Patricios neighbourhood of Buenos Aires. The club is notable for its association football, football team, that currently plays in the Argentine Primera División, Primera Divi ...

in the top flight, for free. At the end of the campaign, the side were tied with

Gimnasia y Esgrima de La Plata Club de Gimnasia y Esgrima La Plata (; ''La Plata Gymnastics and Fencing Club''), also known simply as Gimnasia, is an Argentine professional sports club based in the city of La Plata, Buenos Aires Province. Founded in 1887 as "Club de Gimnasia ...

for the second-to-last position in the relegation ranking, and thus needed to play a tiebreaker, losing it 2–0. Following Huracán's relegation, Zárate's contract at the

Parque Patricios Parque Patricios is a ''barrio'' located on the southern side of Buenos Aires, Argentina belonging to the fourth ''comuna''. Parque Patricios underwent a transformation during the beginning of the 1900s. The government moved the main slaughterho ...

ended and he signed with another club in the second division,

Defensa y Justicia Club Social y Deportivo Defensa y Justicia, commonly known as Defensa y Justicia, is an Argentine football club from Florencio Varela, Buenos Aires, established in 1935.

, again on a free transfer. After his retirement he became a

football agent A sports agent is a legal representative (hence agent (law), agent) for professional sports figures such as athletes and coaches. They procure and negotiate employment and Testimonial, endorsement contracts for the principal (commercial law), at ...

, representing Maximiliano Romero among others and arranging his December 2017 transfer of Romero from Vélez to

PSV Eindhoven Philips Sport Vereniging (; ), abbreviated as PSV and internationally known as PSV Eindhoven (), is a Dutch sports club from Eindhoven, Netherlands. It is best known for its professional association football, football department, which has pla ...

International career

Zárate made his debut for

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

on 9 March 2005, a

friendly match An exhibition game (also known as a friendly, scrimmage, demonstration, training match, pre-season game, warmup match, or preparation match, depending at least in part on the sport) is a sport, sporting event whose prize money and impact on th ...

with

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

in which the former only fielded players from the domestic league. He scored in a 1–1 draw, in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

. Also in that year, Zárate made his second and last appearance, playing 15 minutes in a 2–1 win in

Bolivia Bolivia, officially the Plurinational State of Bolivia, is a landlocked country located in central South America. The country features diverse geography, including vast Amazonian plains, tropical lowlands, mountains, the Gran Chaco Province, w ...

for the

2006 FIFA World Cup The 2006 FIFA World Cup was the 18th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international Association football, football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which had won the right to FIFA World Cup hosts ...

qualifiers.

International goals

:''Scores and results list Argentina's goal tally first, score column indicates score after Zárate goal''.

Personal life

Zárate has three brothers, all footballers: younger Mauro and older Sergio and

Ariel Ariel may refer to: Film and television *Ariel Award, a Mexican Academy of Film award * ''Ariel'' (film), a 1988 Finnish film by Aki Kaurismäki *, a Russian film directed by Yevgeni Kotov * ''ARIEL Visual'' and ''ARIEL Deluxe'', a 1989 and 1991 ...

, with the first two eventually representing the Argentina national team. Rolando's son, Tobías, also became a professional footballer.

Honours

Vélez Sársfield *

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 ...

: 1998 Clausura, 2005 Clausura Individual *

: Top scorer 2004 Clausura (13 goals)

References

External links

Vélez Sarsfield official profile
* * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Zarate, Rolando 1978 births Living people Footballers from Morón Partido Argentine sportspeople of Chilean descent Argentine sportspeople of Italian descent Naturalised citizens of Spain Argentine men's footballers Men's association football forwards Argentine Primera División players Primera Nacional players Club Atlético Vélez Sarsfield footballers Club Atlético River Plate footballers Club Atlético Huracán footballers La Liga players Segunda División players Segunda División B players Terrassa FC footballers Real Madrid Castilla footballers Real Madrid CF players Real Murcia CF players Ciudad de Murcia footballers Scottish Premier League players Livingston F.C. players Saudi Pro League players Al-Ittihad Club (Jeddah) players Liga MX players Tigres UANL footballers C.F. Monterrey players Barcelona S.C. footballers Argentina men's international footballers Argentine expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Spain Expatriate men's footballers in Scotland Expatriate men's footballers in Saudi Arabia Expatriate men's footballers in Mexico Expatriate men's footballers in Ecuador Argentine expatriate sportspeople in Spain Argentine expatriate sportspeople in Mexico Argentine football agents Zárate family