Cris

Cristiano Marques Gomes is a centre back at Gremio football club. He was born on June 3, 1977 in Guarulhos, Brazil.

Cristiano started to play football at his local club Corinthians and featured for the club in different youth football tournaments. Later Corinthians offered the player his first professional contract and in the summer of 1995 the defender joined the senior squad of the club. However, he never became the regular player of Corinthians and in the summer of 1999 was transferred to Cruzeiro. Although the new club was not so big as the previous one, the footballer got the opportunity to gain more play experience and perfect his skills. He quickly made to the first team and scored 13 goals in 122 appearances.

In 2003 Cris went on loan to Bayer Leverkusen, and although he came in only twice in the season of 2003/2004, his prominent talent caught the eye of a French club Lyon. In August 2004 Cristiano Gomes signed up with the club for €3.5 million. In the season of 2005/2006 he was named “Gold Star” (étoile d’or) by a respectful professional magazine France Football. Cris captained the team since 2007 and shot 20 goals in 223 matches.

In the summer of 2012 the defender joined a Turkish club Galatasaray but did not manage to find his solid place in the squad and at the end of the year moved to his homeland and joined Gremio.

As for Cris’s international career, he was called up for the Brazilian National U23 Team 5 times from 1999 till 2000. From 2001 till 2009 he played for the Brazilian National Team.