On 29 August 2009, at Balaídos, Celta were losing to Numancia in the Spanish second division when an 18-year-old full-back came on for Roberto Lago at half-time. The match ended 1-2, but that substitution began a fourteen-season spell in the first team. Hugo Mallo Novegil (Marín, Pontevedra, 22 June 1991) is a Spanish right-back. He played 449 competitive matches for Celta de Vigo between 2009 and 2023, captained the club and went on to play for Internacional of Porto Alegre and Aris Thessaloniki.
He started out in local youth football. He spent a year in the under-14 ranks at Pontevedra CF and then joined Celta's academy, where he finished his development. In the summer of 2009 the club called him up for first-team pre-season along with Yoel Rodríguez. He went back to the reserves at first. A place opened up when Edu Moya, the squad's right-back, was left out of the team during a dispute with the club over unpaid wages. Mallo made his debut against Numancia and ended that 2009-10 season with 25 league appearances.
His first season was not without setbacks. On 3 April 2010 he was sent off for conceding a penalty against Real Unión. On 16 October 2010 he scored his first goal, in a 2-2 draw away to Villarreal B, and that year he became the undisputed starter at right-back. In 2011-12 he started all 34 league matches he played. Celta finished second and returned to the top flight in 2012 after five years in the second tier.
Spain youth teams
He won three caps for Spain's under-19 side in 2010. One came in a 3-0 win over Italy in the group stage of the European Under-19 Championship, where Spain reached the final and finished runners-up. In the summer of 2011 he was called into the squad for the Under-20 World Cup in Colombia as a replacement for the injured Martín Montoya. He played all five of Spain's matches before they went out in the quarter-finals. He earned three under-21 caps, making his debut against Georgia in European qualifying in September 2011 and winning his last cap against Italy in November 2012. On 20 May 2016 he played for the unofficial Galicia team in a 1-1 draw with Venezuela at Riazor.
La Liga, injury and the armband
He made his La Liga debut on 18 August 2012 in a 0-1 home defeat by Málaga. On 9 January 2013, in a Copa del Rey match away to Real Madrid, he tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee and missed the rest of the season. By the start of 2013-14 he was third captain at 22. His first top-flight goal came on 23 May 2015 in a 3-2 win over Espanyol. Over time he inherited the armband once worn by Borja Oubiña. In 2016-17 he scored in the Galician derby, a 4-1 win over Deportivo, and played 12 matches in the Europa League, where Celta reached the semi-finals. One of his goals in that run came in the second leg of the last-16 tie in Krasnodar.
Club records and farewell to Celta
On 5 May 2018 he made his 300th appearance for the club. In August that year he turned down Fulham and signed a new five-year deal. On 24 November 2019, at Villarreal, he reached 350 appearances and became the youngest Celta player to get there. In November 2020 the coaching staff took the captaincy from him and gave it to Iago Aspas. By June 2021 he had passed Aleksandr Mostovoi's club record of 235 top-flight games. On 15 August 2021 his foul on Luis Suárez set off a brawl during a defeat by Atlético Madrid. He was sent off along with Mario Hermoso and a member of the opposition's fitness staff, and thirteen days later he returned for his 400th match. He left on 8 June 2023 when his contract expired, with 309 top-flight appearances, more than any other Celta player at that point, and 449 competitive games and 12 goals in total.
Brazil and Greece
In August 2023 he joined Internacional of Porto Alegre, where he was reunited with Eduardo Coudet, his former coach at Celta. Five days after signing he made his debut as a 62nd-minute substitute in a 0-1 home defeat by Fortaleza. On 27 September 2023 he scored at the Maracanã in a 2-2 draw with Fluminense in the first leg of the Copa Libertadores semi-finals. A left-thigh muscle injury ended his campaign, which closed with 9 appearances and one goal: 6 in the Brazilian top flight and 3 in the Libertadores. In August 2024 he signed a two-year deal with Aris Thessaloniki. In the 2024-25 Greek Super League he made 20 league appearances and scored once.
InternacionalDefenderMarket value €240.0K