Matías Damián Alonso Vallejo (; born 16 April 1985) is a Uruguayan former professional
footballer
A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...
manager
Management (or managing) is the administration of organizations, whether businesses, nonprofit organizations, or a government bodies through business administration, nonprofit management, or the political science sub-field of public administra ...
Montevideo
Montevideo (, ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Uruguay, largest city of Uruguay. According to the 2023 census, the city proper has a population of 1,302,954 (about 37.2% of the country's total population) in an area of . M ...
, Alonso started his career at local
Club Atlético River Plate
Club Atlético River Plate is an Argentine professional sports club based in the Belgrano, Buenos Aires, Belgrano neighborhood of Buenos Aires. Founded in 1901, the club is named after the English name for the city's estuary, Río de la Plata. ...
, signing with
Peñarol
Club Atlético Peñarol (), more commonly referred to as Peñarol, is a Uruguayan professional football club based in Montevideo. The club currently competes in the Uruguayan Primera División, the highest tier in Uruguayan football.
The nam ...
in 2005 and not being successful at either club. He moved to Spain subsequently, first with
RC Celta de Vigo
Real Club Celta de Vigo (; ), commonly known as Celta Vigo, is a Spanish professional football club based in Vigo, Galicia, that competes in La Liga, the top tier of Spanish football. Nicknamed ''Os Celestes'' (The Sky Blues), the club was fou ...
Segunda División B
Segunda División B (English: second division B) was the third tier of the Spanish football league system containing 102 teams divided into five groups, until it was replaced by the new structure in 2021. It was administered by the Royal Spanish ...
.
Alonso joined
Real Murcia CF
Real Murcia Club de Fútbol, S.A.D., commonly known as Real Murcia (, "Royal Murcia"), is a Spanish football club based in Murcia, in the Región de Murcia. Founded in 1919, it currently plays in , playing home matches at Estadio Nueva Condo ...
in 2007, being immediately loaned to another team in the third division, SE Ibiza-Eivissa. He appeared rarely for the main squad after returning, spending most of his spell with the
B side
The A-side and B-side are the two sides of vinyl records and cassettes, and the terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side of a single usually features a recording that its artist, producer, or ...
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 ...
, Alonso joined
Granada CF
Granada Club de Fútbol (), known simply as Granada or ''"Graná"'', is a professional List of football clubs in Spain, Spanish football club based in the city of Granada, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, that currently plays in Segunda ...
in July 2010. In the following
transfer window
In association football, a transfer window is the period during the year in which a football club, club can add players to their squad who were previously under contract with another club. Such a Transfer (association football), transfer is comp ...
, without having made any official appearances for the
Andalusia
Andalusia ( , ; , ) is the southernmost autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community in Peninsular Spain, located in the south of the Iberian Peninsula, in southwestern Europe. It is the most populous and the second-largest autonomou ...
ns, he returned to his country, signing with C.A. Cerro on loan.
On 1 September 2011, Alonso agreed to a one-year loan at
Zamora CF
Zamora Club de Fútbol is a Spanish football team based in Zamora, in the autonomous community of Castile and León. Founded in 1968 it plays in , holding home games at ''Estadio Ruta de la Plata'', with a capacity of 7,813 seaters.
History ...
in Spain's third tier. In February 2013, following a brief spell in
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
, he returned to his homeland and joined
Juventud de Las Piedras
Club Atlético Juventud is a sports club based in Las Piedras, Uruguay, Las Piedras, Canelones Department, Canelones, Uruguay. CA Juventud won promotion to the Primera División Uruguaya to start in August 2007.A.S. Bari of the
Serie B
The Serie B (), officially known as Serie BKT for sponsorship reasons, is the second-highest division in the Italian football league system after the Serie A. It has been operating for over ninety years since the 1929–30 season. It had b ...
. Just three months later, however, he left Italy and moved to
Defensor Sporting
Defensor Sporting Club is a sports club based in Montevideo, Uruguay. Founded in 1913, Defensor has several sports sections, with football and basketball being the most important and the ones in which the club has achieved significant achievement ...
.
Coaching career
On 10 January 2025, Alonso was named as the new manager of the Uruguay under-17 team.
Personal life
Alonso's older brother, Iván, was also a footballer and a forward. He too began his career at River Plate.
His cousin,
Diego Alonso
Diego Martín Alonso López (; born 16 April 1975) is an Uruguayan professional football manager and former player who played as a striker.
Other than in his own country, he played football in Argentina, Spain, Mexico and China in a 16-year ca ...