- Source: Marcelo Espina
Marcelo Fabián Espina Barrano (born April 28, 1967, in Buenos Aires) is a retired Argentine football midfielder. He played for a number of clubs in Argentina and Chile and represented the Argentina national football team. In the present, he is a soccer match analyst at ESPN South America .
Club career
Espina began his career at Platense in the Primera Division Argentina in 1986. In 1989, he moved to Mexico where he played for Irapuato and then Atlante F.C. In 1992, he returned to Argentina to play for Lanús, but after only one season he returned to Platense.
In 1995, he joined Colo-Colo in Chile, in his first spell at the club he was part of 3 title winning teams. In 1999, he left Colo-Colo to play for Racing Santander of La Liga in Spain. After 2 seasons with Racing, Espina returned to Colo-Colo where he retired in 2004.
International career
Espina represented the Argentina national football team on 15 occasions between 1994 and 1996 scoring 1 goal. He also captained national team in 1995. He is best remembered for being the first player after Diego Maradona's retirement from the National Team to wear the #10 shirt, during the tenure of coach Daniel Passarella, although ostensibly with less skill or success.
Managerial career
After retiring as a player he had spells as manager of Colo-Colo and Everton in Chile. In 2010, he joined Platense of the regionalised 3rd division of Argentine football.
Personal life
Espina naturalized Chilean by residence.
His son, Santiago, was born in Chile and played football at professional level for Platense, San Lorenzo and Deportes Copiapó.
He has worked as a football commentator and analyst for ESPN Chile.
Honours
= Club
=Platense
Primera Division Argentina Topscorer (1): 1994 Clausura
Colo-Colo
Primera División de Chile (4): 1996, 1997–C, 1998, 2002–C
Copa Chile (1): 1996
References
External links
Argentine Primera Statistics[usurped] at FutbolXXI.com (in Spanish)
Marcelo Espina – Liga MX stats at MedioTiempo.com (archived) (in Spanish)
La Liga Statistics at LFP.es at the Wayback Machine (archived 2004-11-18) (in Spanish)
Marcelo Espina at HistoriadeColoColo (in Spanish)