Faryd Mondragón

Club

International

Early career

Mondragón was selected for the 1992 Olympic tournament. He made his full international debut against Venezuela in a 1–1 friendly home draw on 21 May 1993. He was selected for the Colombia national team at the 1994 FIFA World Cup and the Copa América of 1993 and 1997. Profiting from the absence of regular goalkeeper René Higuita, he played at the latter tournament in Bolivia, which ended with quarter-final elimination to the host team.

1998 World Cup

During the 1998 FIFA World Cup in France, Mondragón started in goal for all three of Colombia's games, including the final group match against England. Despite conceding two goals, he made some impressive saves and in doing so kept the score down to 2–0, with the BBC's South American football correspondent Tim Vickery saying that Mondragón was "single-handedly responsible for the fact that England did not run up a cricket score". At the end of the game, Mondragón broke down in tears (as the match decided who would go through to the next round after Romania) and David Seaman, England's goalkeeper, did his best to console him. According to German footballing legend Franz Beckenbauer, Mondragón had been the best goalkeeper of the first round.

1998–2014

At the 2003 CONCACAF Gold Cup, Mondragón was in goal for three games, including the 2–0 quarter-final loss to Brazil. Two years later, he played all five games in a run to the semi-finals, including the 2–1 quarter-final win over reigning…

Early career

Born in Cali, Mondragón began his career began at hometown club Deportivo Cali, and he moved to Independiente Santa Fe and then Cerro Porteño in Paraguay. Mondragon held a contract with Cerro Porteño until May 1993. His deal Cerro Porteño was a six-month loan with the option to buy for US$700,000. During his stay at Cerro Porteño, he lived in the Hotel Excelsior in Asunción. In the 1993 Cerro Porteño team, he played with Paraguayans Carlos Gamarra, Francisco Arce, Estanislao Struway, Virgilio Ferreira, Ecuadorian Luis Capurro and Brazilians Alex Rossi, Silvio Wielewski, Carlos Antonio Chaves and Luís Carlos Carvalho dos Reis. On 23 March 1993, it was announced that Mondragón would join Argentine club River Plate when Cerro Porteño finished its participation in the Copa Libertadores. Following a Copa Libertadores game for Cerro Porteno against Newell's Old Boys in Rosario, Mondragón flew to Buenos Aires to sign his contract and Cerro Porteño discarded the possibility of permanently signing him because the cost was too high. Mondragón joined the Argentine first division side Argentinos Juniors in 1993, and then made his international debut for Colombia. The following year he moved to Independiente where he won, among other titles, the 1995 Supercopa Libertadores against Flamengo. Apart from some brief periods, he largely stood at the club until 2001. At the end of 1998, Mondragón signed on loan for Real Zaragoza in Spain's La Liga. He was unable to take…

Mondragón is of Lebanese descent. Mondragón was nicknamed "El Turco" ("The Turk"), a name given in Latin America to people descending from the Turkish-governed Ottoman Empire, regardless of their ethnicity. His first name Faryd means "unique or unmatched" in Arabic. He is a Maronite and has said so publicly along with making the sign of the cross on multiple occasions before matches.