Claudio Maldonado

Early career

As a child, Maldonado was with Escuela de Fútbol Municipal de Curicó (Municipal Football Academy of Curicó), later named Juventud 2000, what was founded by the former professional footballer Luis Hernán Álvarez. Next, he moved to Colo-Colo youth ranks after being seen by Néstor Pékerman.

São Paulo

He spent three seasons with São Paulo making 36 Campeonato Brasileiro Série A appearances with the team.

Cruzeiro

In May 2003, Vanderlei Luxemburgo, then coach of Cruzeiro, bought the services of Maldonado. At the time of the purchase, Maldonado's then girlfriend was Luxemburgo's daughter. Nevertheless, while with Cruzeiro, Maldonado experienced the most success of his career. In 2003, he played for the first team in the history of Brazilian football to win the triple crown.

Santos

For the 2006 season, Maldonado was reunited with former Cruzeiro's coach Luxemburgo at Santos for a fee of $4.5 million. However at the end of the Brazilian season was scheduled to have ankle surgery which caused him to miss up to two months. After recuperating Maldonado continued playing for Santos reaching the semi-finals of the 2007 Copa Libertadores. Currently Santos has completed the 2007 Campeonato Brasileiro Série A in second place and are eligible to compete in the upcoming Copa Libertadores 2008. He was being tracked by Fenerbahçe, Milan, Real Madrid and Ajax but no firm offers better than Fenerbahçe have been made. At 28 he was at the peak of…

In 2018, Maldonado started his coaching journey as an assistant coach to Héctor Tapia at Colo-Colo, the club where he began his professional career and retired from three years prior. He followed Tapia to Real Garcilaso in 2019. In 2020, he joined Maurício Barbieri as his assistant coach at CSA, continuing to work together at Red Bull Bragantino and later at Vasco da Gama. In 2024, he followed him to Mexican club Juárez and Athletico Paranaense.

As of 6 September 2020.

Player

Colo-Colo Primera División: 1998, 2014 Clausura São Paulo Campeonato Paulista: 2000, 2002 Cruzeiro Campeonato Brasileiro Série A: 2003 Campeonato Mineiro: 2004 Santos Campeonato Paulista: 2006, 2007 Fenerbahçe UEFA Champions League Quarter-Finals(1): 2008 Flamengo Campeonato Brasileiro Série A: 2009 Campeonato Carioca: 2011 Corinthians Recopa Sudamericana: 2013 Chile U20 L'Alcúdia International Tournament (1): 1998 Chile Olympic Sydney Olympic Games: Bronze medal