Joaquín Botero Vaca (born 10 December 1977) is a Bolivian former professional footballer who played as a striker.
He is the second all-time top goalscorer for the Bolivia national team with 20 goals and was awarded the World's Best Top Division Goal Scorer by the IFFHS for scoring 49 goals in a season Club Bolívar in 2002.
Club career
Botero not only played in Bolivia's football league, he also played abroad, in the football leagues of Mexico, Argentina and Venezuela.
After scoring 133 goals for Club Bolívar and becoming the club's second highest goalscorer of all time behind Luis Fernando Salinas, he left the club to play abroad.
Botero's first foreign club was the Mexican team Pumas. In his first season with Pumas, the 2003 Apertura, he scored three goals in 17 games. After scoring another three in nine games in the 2004 Clausura, Botero broke out in the 2004 Apertura, registering 11 goals in 19 games.
In 2006, he joined San Lorenzo de Almagro of the Primera División de Argentina and in 2007 he played for Deportivo Táchira of Venezuela. After an unsuccessful stint in both clubs, Botero returned to Bolívar as a free agent in 2008.
He joined the Mexican team Correcaminos UAT for the Clausura 2009 season, marking his return to Mexico.
In January 2010, he was loaned out to Al Arabi Kuwait for $170,000. He made four appearances and scored three goals. Argentina's first loss under the recently appointed manager, Diego Maradona. On 15 May 2009, Botero surprisingly announced the end of his era with the national team, putting as an excuse that his motivation "was not there anymore."
Botero represented his country in 30 FIFA World Cup qualification matches, scoring 16 goals.
Career statistics
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center"
|+ Appearances and goals by national team and year
|-
!National team!!Year!!Apps!!Goals
|-
|rowspan="9"|Bolivia
|1999||3||0
|-
|2000||6||3
|-
|2001||7||3
|-
|2002||2||0
|-
|2003||4||4
|-
|2004||10||2
|-
|2005||5||0
|-
|2008||9||5
|-
|2009||2||3
|-
!colspan="2"|Total!!48!!20
|}
:Scores and results list Bolivia's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Botero goal.
{| class="wikitable sortable"
|+ List of international goals scored by Joaquín Botero