CAVENAGHI: RIVER PLATE CAREER REVIEWED

Retired Argentine striker Fernando Cavenaghi spent a big part of his career at River Plate in his native Argentina starting from when his professional football career started. His River Plate debut was during the 2000/01 season and he went on to score once in five games before the season ended. In his first full season in the River Plate first team, Fernando Cavenaghi scored 17 goals in 23 goals including a treble against Estudiantes.

Cavenaghi moved abroad for the first time when he left River Plate to join Spartak Moscow in July 2004. Russian Premier League team Spartak Moscow paid around $12m to sign him and he was a record buy at the time. The striker didn’t adapt to Russian football and he would later join Bordeaux in the French league. His second spell at River Plate started in July 2011 after he left Bordeaux with a year still to go on his contract. Upon his return to River Plate, Fernando Cavenaghi was made the club captain. At the time, River Plate had been relegation to the second division.

In the first season of his second River Plate spell, Cavenaghi scored 19 goals in 37 games including four goals against Gimnasia de Jujuy. He helped River Plate win the 2011/12 Primera B Nacional in his one season back at the club as they sealed a return to the top flight.

After spending just one season at River Plate, Cavenaghi returned to Spain to sign for Villarreal in the summer of 2012 while they were in the Segunda Division and his stay at the club lasted for just six months before he joined Mexican team Pachuca in January 2013. He had scored four times in 19 games for Villarreal.Cavenaghi was at Pachuca until the start of 2014 when he returned to River Plate for his third spell at the club. The striker would wear the number nine jersey during his third spell as River Plate won several trophies.