Cristian Zapata

Cristian Zapata is a Colombia international football player who currently features for the Italian and European giants AC Milan. He is a versatile defender who can play as a centre-back, a right back or as a left back.

Zapata started his professional club football career at Colombian giants Deportivo de Cali and played for them for the 2004-2005 season. He featured in 17 league matches for Deportivo and was signed by Udinese in 2005.

Zapata became a very important player for Udinese and very quickly became a first team regular and one of the best players for Udinese at the moment. He was crucial in the Udine-based outfit reaching the Champions League, playing in a total of 168 Serie A matches, scoring five goals in the process.

In 2011 Villarreal signed Zapata, but he failed to prevent the Yellow Submarine from suffering relegation at the end of the 2011-12 season. In the summer of 2012 he moved to Milan on loan for the 2012-13 campaign.

Zapata made his international debut for Colombia in 2007 and despite his young age is one of the regular members of the Colombian national team.