Gustavo Cuellar

Gustavo Cuéllar is a Colombian football player who was born on 14 October 1992 in Barranquilla, Colombia.

Gustavo is a defender and primarily plays from the position of central-midfielder and defensive-midfielder. Currently, he is playing for the Série A club Flamengo as well as Colombian national football team.

Background

At the age of 16, Gustavo started his professional career by joining Colombian club Deportivo Cali that competes in Categoría Primera A. Staying with the youth squad and academy of the club, he developed himself into professional. Soon, his hard work paid off when he got promoted to the senior squad just after a year. Later, with the senior squad, he played over a hundred matches between the year of 2009 and 2015.

Gustavo has also represented Colombia at 2009 FIFA U-17 World Cup. There, he had scored 2 goals playing every game of Colombia at the tournament.

Gustavo also played 2014-15 season for another Categoría Primera A club Junior on loan.

Debut

Gustavo played his role as a defender quite superbly for both the club as well as at the U-17 level for Colombia. As a result, he got his first international call-up in 2015 and made his debut for Colombia on 8 September against Peru. Match had ended up on 1-1 draw.

On 14 May 2016, he played his first match for the eminent Brazilian club Flamengo. Coming up as a starter and playing till the very end, he helped his team to clinch the victory by 1-0 against Sport Recife.

Rise to glory

Cuellar was acquired in the national team to battle at the South America World Cup qualifiers and on 29 March 2016, Cuéllar got his very second international match against Ecuador.

After his Série A debut, he was included for the second game too but then he missed the third game as he was not in the squad. Later, he did played a few games but not as a starter. On 31 July 2016, coming in the 83rd minute of the game, he provided a late assist to ensure the 2-0 victory against Coritiba FC.

On 26 January 2017, he played a friendly for Colombia against star-studded Brazil. Colombia had fought very well but lost to the Brazilians by 1-0.

Though he was not an instant hit for Flamengo but slowly, he strengthen his place in the squad and became a regular. In the year of 2017, he played almost every game for the club, most of them featuring in the starting eleven. On 28 June 2017, Cuéllar scored his first goal for the club in a fixture of Copa do Brasil against Santos as his team won by 2-0 eventually.

Having him in the team, Flamengo also won 2017 Campeonato Carioca title.

Records

Apart from 3 international matches for Colombia, Cuellar has played overall 165 club football games for different clubs. In Liga Águila I, playing 49 fixtures, he has 1 goal as well as 2 assists in his name. Gustavo has featured in 43 Série A matches also.