Juan Roman Riquelme Biography

Juan Román Riquelme (born June 26, 1978 in San Fernando, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina) is a football player, who currently plays for Villarreal CF of Spain.

Argentine giants Boca Juniors and River Plate noticed him when he was a junior player in Argentinos Juniors. Being a Boca fan, he decided to move to that team, who paid 800.000 US dollars for his contract in 1995. A year later, November 10, 1996, Romy played his first professional match (Boca Juniors 2 - 0 Unión de Santa Fe) and two weeks later he scored his first goal (Boca Juniors 6 - 0 Huracán).
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With the Argentina national football team, Romy played 24 matches, scoring 5 goals. He also won the Southamerican Youth Championship, and the Football World Youth Championship, both in 1997 and with coach José Pekerman.

In 2002, after seven successful years with Boca Juniors, the central midfielder was transferred to FC Barcelona for 9 million Euros. Because of the arguably unfair pressure put on him to change the (at the time) struggling club's fortunes, Riquelme was unable to find his place in the team and was loaned to Villarreal a year later, where he currently plays along with fellow Argentine internationals Juan Pablo Sorín and Luciano Figueroa.

He is regarded as an extremely talented playmaker with excellent field vision, and, with 15 goals and 11 assists, is often noted as the main factor in Villarreal's explosive 2005 campaign. At the end of that season, Spanish sports newspaper Marca awarded him the title for Most Artistic Player. As a result of his influential play, he earned a nomination for the 2005 FIFA World Player of the Year award. In an effort to keep him, Villarreal bought 75% of Riquelme's rights from Barcelona for 5 million euros, and gave the player a 4-year contract.

Juan Román RiquelmeA peculiar situation arose when, on December 7, 2005, Villarreal, with Riquelme's help, beat French club Lille OSC 1-0 to win its UEFA Champions League group, beating out English giants Manchester United F.C., Lille, and Portuguese team SL Benfica, advancing to the knockout stages in the club's debut in the Champions League. Because of an clause in the contract of the transfer from Barcelona, Villarreal had to pay one million euros to the Catalan club. The contract includes another two one-million euros clauses; one if Villarreal ends in one of the top 4 positions of the Spanish Primera Liga in the 2005/2006 season, and an identical one for the 2006/2007 season.

Profile:

Full name Juan Román Riquelme
Nickname(s) Romy
Date of birth June 26, 1978
Place of birth Buenos Aires, Argentina
Current club Villarreal CF
Position(s) Attacking midfielder
Youth club(s)
1995 Argentinos Juniors
Boca Juniors
Professional club(s)*
1996-2002
2002-2003
2003- Boca Juniors
FC Barcelona
Villarreal CF 170 (?44)
30 (3)
68 (23)
National team**
2004 - Argentina 24

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