2008 Copa Libertadores Final: Players that Have Played Abroad

In cased you missed it, Ecuador's LDU beat Brazil's Fluminense (at nearly 9,000 feet altitude) with four first-half goals on their way to a 4-2 win in the first leg of South America's Copa Libertadores final last Wednesday. They're still far from putting away the series because they'll have to play in front of nearly 100,000 Brazilian fans at the Maracanã in Rio tomorrow night (where Flu beat Boca Juniors and São Paulo by two goals each in the last two rounds).

I always find it interesting to look into players past clubs to see their career progression prior to being on a "Championship-level" club. These are all of the players on Fluminense and LDU that have played in nations outside of Brazil and Ecuador respectively.


Fluminense Players That Have Played Outside of Brazil:

Player	Club	Club Country	Years Abroad
Gabriel	Malaga CF	Spain	2005-06
Thiago Silva	FC Porto Dynamo Moscow	Portugal Russia	2004 2005
Luiz Alberto	Saint-Étienne Real Sociedad	France Spain	2000-01 2001-02/2004/05
Júnior César	Santos Laguna	Mexico	2005-06
Ygor	IK Start	Norway	2007 - (On Loan)
Somália	NK MIK CM Celje Feyenoord Al-Hilal Busan	Slovenia Netherlands Saudi Arabia Korea	1998-99 1999-2000 2003-04 2005
Washington	Fenerbahçe Tokyo Verdy 1969 Urawa Reds	Turkey Japan Japan	2002 2005 2006-07
Thiago Neves	Vegalta Sendai	Japan	2006
Dodô	Ulsan Hyundai Oita Trinita Al-Ain	Korea Japan UAE	2003-04 2005 2006-07
Roger	Vissel Kobe	Japan	2004-05
Fabinho	Gamba Osaka Shimizu S-Pulse	Japan Japan	2002 2004
Dario Conca	River Plate Universidad Catolica Rosario Central	Argentina Chile Argentina	2002-04 2004-06 2006
Rafael	Messina	Italy	2004-06
David	Yverdon Pogoń Szczecin	Switzerland Poland	2000/03-05 2002
Ricardo Berna	Vegalta Sendai	Japan	1998

LDU Quito Players That Have Played Outside of Ecuador:

Player	Club	Club Nation	Years Abroad
José Cevallos	Once Caldas	Colombia	2005
Norberto Araujo	Aldosivi Arsenal de Sarandi Racing de Cordoba Sport Boys Sporting Cristal	Argentina Argentina Argentina Peru Peru	1998-99 2000-01 2001 2002-03 2004-06
Agustin Delgado	Cruz Azul Necaxa Southampton UNAM Pumas	Mexico Mexico England Mexico	1998 1999-2001 2001-04 2005
Franklin Salas	Red Star Belgrade	Serbia	2007-08
Claudio Bieler	Colon de Santa Fe Atlético Rafaela Colo-Colo	Argentina Argentina Chile	2005-06 2006-07 2007
Joffre Guerrón	Boca Juniors Getafe CF	Argentina Spain	2005 After Tournament
Enrique Vera	Resistencia Sol de America Iteño	Paraguay Paraguay Paraguay	1999 2000-02 2003
Jairo Campos	KAA Gent	Belgium	2004
Damian Manso	Newell's Old Boys SC Bastia Xanthi	Argentina France Greece	1996-01/02-03/04-05 2001-02 2006-07

I've mentioned in the past that I follow the J-League, so I think it's pretty cool that Fluminense has 6 players that have played in Japan in their career. In fact, Washington was the leading scorer for the league champion Urawa Red Diamonds in 2006, with 26 goals and was also named to the league best eleven that season.

It's really amazing to see all of the former nations where the players have played, some of these guys are real journeymen. Here's a listing of the former nations that the finalist players have played in earlier in their career.

Fluminense: Past Nations Played In:
Spain
Portugal
Russia
France
Mexico
Norway
Slovenia
Netherlands
Saudi Arabia
Korea
Turkey
Japan
UAE
Argentina
Chile
Italy
Switzerland
Poland

LDU: Past Nations Played In:
Colombia
Argentina
Peru
Mexico
England
Serbia
Chile
Paraguay
Belgium
France
Greece