Javier Saviola

Javier Pedro Saviola Fernández was born in 1981 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He has Spanish citizenship.

Currently the Argentine plays for Olympiacos. He began his professional career at Club Atlético River Plate and made his debut at the age of 16. Saviola helped the club to win the 1999 Apertura and 2000 Clausura titles and in 1999 he was named the South American Footballer of the Year.

In 2001, he moved to Spain where he joined FC Barcelona for £15m. During his first season with the club Saviola scored 17 goals, his second season wasn’t so good and after the third one he was loaned to AS Monaco FC. After that he was sent on loan to Sevilla FC and in 2006/07 Saviola played for Barcelona, appearing in 18 games due to his teammates’ injuries.

In July 2007, Javier joined Real Madrid on a three-year contract though his first season wasn’t good enough and all in all he made 28 appearances, scored five goals and by the end of June Saviola moved to S.L. Benfica. He helped the team to win the Portuguese League in 2009/10, Portuguese League Cup in 2009/10, 2010/11 and 2011/12. Javier was awarded as the Portuguese Liga Player of the Month. For the 2012/13 season he joined Málaga CF and featured in 27 matches.

At the end of the season the Argentine joined a Greek outfit Olympiacos.

Saviola represented Argentina at the 2001 FIFA U-20 World Cup and was named the record top scorer. He wasn’t called up for the 2002 World Cup but was selected for the 2004 Olympic Games, when they won the gold. He appeared in the 2006 World Cup games and in December 2009 he retired from international football.