Jorge Alexander Rodas Hurtarte (born October 9, 1971) is a retired

Guatemala Guatemala, officially the Republic of Guatemala, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico, to the northeast by Belize, to the east by Honduras, and to the southeast by El Salvador. It is hydrologically b ...

n professional

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

midfielder In the sport of association football, a midfielder takes an Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield position primarily in the middle of the pitch. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in t ...

. He last played for

Aurora F.C. Aurora Fútbol Club is a Guatemalan professional Association football, football club. They are based in Guatemala City and play their home matches in the ''Estadio Cementos Progreso''. Once one of the most powerful teams in the country and a tra ...

in the Guatemalan '' Primera División'' as of the end of the 2007-08 season. Rodas was the first Guatemalan footballer to play in

Major League Soccer Major League Soccer (MLS) is a professional Association football, soccer league in North America and the highest level of the United States soccer league system. It comprises 30 teams, with 27 in the United States and 3 in Canada, and is sanc ...

, when he starred for

San José Clash The San Jose Earthquakes are an American professional soccer club based in San Jose, California. The Earthquakes compete in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Western Conference. Originally known as the San Jose Clash, the franchise ...

in 1996. He was also a member of the Guatemala national team. He is the younger brother of Julio Rodas, who was also a member of the national team.

Club career

Rodas began playing professionally for

Municipal A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the gov ...

Guatemala City Guatemala City (, also known colloquially by the nickname Guate), is the Capital city, national capital and largest city of the Guatemala, Republic of Guatemala. It is also the Municipalities of Guatemala, municipal capital of the Guatemala Depa ...

, where he became first known for his abilities as a central midfielder and his shooting range. After winning the 1993-94 league tournament with Municipal, he signed with their arch-rival,

Comunicaciones Comunicaciones Fútbol Club S.A., better known as Comunicaciones F.C. or Comunicaciones, is a professional association football, football club based in Guatemala City. They compete in the Liga Nacional de Fútbol de Guatemala, Liga Nacional, th ...

, where he would be part of seven championship-winning squads.

Major League Soccer

In 1996, Rodas became the first Guatemalan to play professionally in the United States, when he was signed by San Jose Clash. He took the field in the first-ever Major League Soccer match on April 6. 1996, when The Clash beat

D.C. United D.C. United is an American professional soccer club based in Washington, D.C. The club competes in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Eastern Conference. Domestically, the club has won four MLS Cups (league championships), four Supp ...

1-0 at home. Alongside players like

Eric Wynalda Eric Boswell Wynalda (born June 9, 1969) is an American soccer coach, television commentator, and former player. He was formerly an analyst and color commentator for soccer coverage on Fox Sports 1 and ESPN. Previously, he served as head coach ...

, John Doyle, and Eddie Lewis, Rodas helped San Jose reach the MLS playoffs that year. He played in 29 matches, made three assists, and scored one goal on a

direct free kick A free kick is a method of restarting play in association football. It is awarded after an infringement of the Laws of the Game (association football), laws by the opposing team. Direct and indirect free kicks Free kicks may be either dire ...

against

New England Revolution The New England Revolution are an American professional association football, soccer club based in the Greater Boston area. The club competes in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Eastern Conference (MLS), Eastern Conference. It is on ...

on August 11, catalogued in the ''San Jose Earthquakes 100 Greatest Goals''

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for digital video disc or digital versatile disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any ki ...

as the team's second-best goal of the year. After the inaugural MLS season, Rodas was transferred back to Communicaciones in January 1997.

Later career

Rodas would stay at Comunicaciones until 2002, and after that he played briefly for

Xelajú MC Quetzaltenango (, also known by its Maya name Xelajú or Xela ) is a municipality and namesake department in western Guatemala. The city is located in a mountain valley at an elevation of above sea level at its lowest part. It may reach above ...

. Later, he joined Deportivo Jalapa, achieving further success by helping the team win the Domestic Cup in consecutive years in 2005 and 2006; he scored the only goal of a 1-0 win over Municipal in the 2006 final. He had other notable individual performances at Jalapa, among them scoring a

hat-trick A hat-trick or hat trick is the achievement of a generally positive feat three times in a match, or another achievement based on the number three. Origin The term first appeared in 1858 in cricket, to describe H. H. Stephenson taking three Wick ...

against Deportivo Heredia in a 3-2 win on which the team advanced to the semi-final of the 2005 apertura tournament. After his tenure with Jalapa ended in 2006, Rodas, aged 35, continued his career with a brief spell with ''Deportivo Mixco'' in the '' Primera División''. For the 2007-08 season, he was signed by former top-division team

, which had been relegated to the ''

Segunda División The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Segunda División, commonly known as Segunda División or La Liga 2, and officially known as LaLiga HyperMotion for sponsorship reasons, is the men's second professional association football division of the Spa ...

'' the previous season. Aurora earned promotion back to the ''Primera División'' for the 2008–2009 season.

International career

Rodas made his debut for

in a May 1991

UNCAF Nations Cup The Copa Centroamericana () was an association football competition organized by UNCAF as its top regional tournament for men's senior national teams from Central America. The tournament was held from 1991 to 2017, every two years in the years be ...

match against

El Salvador El Salvador, officially the Republic of El Salvador, is a country in Central America. It is bordered on the northeast by Honduras, on the northwest by Guatemala, and on the south by the Pacific Ocean. El Salvador's capital and largest city is S ...

alongside his brother

Julio Julio is the Spanish equivalent of the month July and may refer to: *Julio (given name) * Julio (surname) * Júlio de Castilhos, a municipality of the western part of the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil * ''Julio'' (album), a 1983 compilation al ...

. Jorge Rodas earned 38 overall caps, scoring four goals, and represented his country in 12

FIFA World Cup qualification The FIFA World Cup qualification is a set of competitive matches that a national association football team plays in order to qualify for one of the available berths at the final tournament of the men's FIFA World Cup. Qualifying tournaments ar ...

matches and was part of the squads that competed at the

CONCACAF Gold Cup The CONCACAF Gold Cup () is an association football competition organized by CONCACAF as its top continental tournament for men's senior national teams from North America, Central America and the Caribbean. The tournament is held every two ...

tournaments of 1996 and 2000, and at the

of 1995, 1997, and 1999.UNCAF Tournament 1999
- RSSSF His final international was a January 2001 World Cup qualification match against

Costa Rica Costa Rica, officially the Republic of Costa Rica, is a country in Central America. It borders Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the northeast, Panama to the southeast, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, as well as Maritime bo ...

International goals

:''Scores and results list. Guatemala's goal tally first.''

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Rodas, Jorge 1971 births Living people People from Jalapa Department Men's association football midfielders Guatemalan men's footballers Guatemalan expatriate men's footballers Guatemala men's international footballers C.S.D. Municipal players Comunicaciones F.C. players San Jose Earthquakes players C.S.D. Xelajú MC players Aurora F.C. players Major League Soccer players Guatemalan expatriate sportspeople in the United States Expatriate men's soccer players in the United States 1996 CONCACAF Gold Cup players 2000 CONCACAF Gold Cup players