Saturnino Arrúa

Saturnino Arrúa was a leading Paraguayan footballer who was born in Ita, near Asunción, on 6 April 1949.

Nicknamed "El Nino", he began his career at his local team Sportivo Iteño as a fourteen year old, before signing for Cerro Porteño the following year. He flourished as the centre forward at the club and won three Liga Paraguaya winners' medals, as well as finishing top scorer in the league three times. He signed for Real Zaragoza in Spain in 1973 and proved to be a success in La Liga, remaining with the club until 1979 when he returned to Cerro Porteño. In Real Zaragoza he was part of the famous "Zaraguayos" group (a reference to the Paraguayan stars such as Carlos Diarte and Felipe Santiago Ocampos that were playing for Zaragoza at that time). He finished his career with a brief spell at América de Cali of Colombia in 1981. He went on to enter coaching, working for Club 12 de Octubre and Club Atletico 3 de Febrero as well as Cerro Porteño.

He played for the Paraguay national football team 26 times between 1969 and 1980, scoring 13 goals (making him the joint second all-time leading scorer for the country) [http://www.rsssf.com/miscellaneous/para-recintlp.html] .

External links

* [http://www.gratisweb.com/leyendaesdecerro/nino.htm Profile in Spanish]