Cristian Daniel Ledesma (born 24 September 1982) is an Argentine-born Italian retired footballer who played as a central midfielder.
He is a deep lying central midfield playmaker with good vision, passing, and technique; he also possesses a powerful shot with either foot, despite being naturally right-footed, and occasionally scores goals from long range.
In July 2009, with his contract set to expire the following year, Ledesma was excluded from the first team due to disagreements with club chairman Claudio Lotito and did not play any competitive games during the whole first half of the 2009–10 season.
This led the player to formally ask the Lega Calcio arbitration committee for a contract termination due to violation of its terms, only a few weeks after teammate Goran Pandev had taken the same exact action.
[4] After being linked with a move to Internazionale, he ultimately stayed at Lazio and, immediately after the replacement of head coach Davide Ballardini with veteran manager Edoardo Reja, he made his 2009–10 season debut on 14 February, being featured in the starting lineup in a 2–0 win at Parma.
[5] In his 2010–11 campaign, he was one of the protagonists of Lazio's surprising start that led the Rome club to even top the Serie A table for a few weeks between October and November.
[9] On 18 August 2016, Ledesma along with Marcus Berg was the scorer of goal from the penalty spot, helping Panathinaikos win the first leg of the Europa League playoffs and is set to qualify for the group stage, as the Greens crushed Danish Brøndby IF 3–0 at Leoforos stadium.
[10] On 2 October 2016, he scored with two penalty kicks, helping his club to achieve a 3–1 home win against Asteras Tripoli for the 4th day of the 2016–17 season.
[14] On 14 November 2010, Ledesma accepted a call-up by Italy manager Cesare Prandelli for a friendly match against Romania, thus becoming the third oriundo to become part of the Azzurri senior squad in the last ten years, the other two being Mauro Camoranesi and Amauri.
[16] In September 2019 he took over on his first role as a first team manager, coaching Promozione amateurs LUISS, the football branch of the Libera Università Internazionale degli Studi Sociali Guido Carli.