Patrick Kisnorbo

Patrick Fabio Maxime Kisnorbo (born 24 March 1981) is an Australian professional football manager and former player. As a player, Kisnorbo was a primarily a centre-back, but also played as a defensive midfielder. He made eighteen appearances for the Australia national team.

Kisnorbo was a fans' favourite at Leicester City, accumulating over 100 appearances in his four years at the club. During his time with Leicester, he was at the centre of a number of refereeing controversies in which officiating calls were later shown to be wrong. He has also suffered some injuries that affected his playing ability for a time. Kisnorbo has represented Australia at international level in three tournaments; the 2002 and 2004 Nation Cups and the 2007 Asian Cup. He started his professional career at South Melbourne and later played for the Scottish club Hearts before joining Leicester and then transferring to Leeds United.

Kisnorbo won the 2009–10 fans Player of The Season award and also the Players Player Award for Leeds United in his debut season. During his first two years at Leeds, Kisnorbo wore a bandage on his head when playing as 'a superstition' after initially wearing it following a head injury suffered on his Leeds debut.

Kisnorbo was born in Melbourne to a Mauritian father and an Italian mother who was from Trieste. Because of his mother's birth, Kisnorbo holds an Italian passport, which allows him to bypass European Union work permit restrictions. He is fluent in Italian.

Kisnorbo began playing football as a youth in his hometown with Essendon City and Bulleen. As a 15-Year old, he moved to South Melbourne's youth team, where he stayed for two seasons in the National Soccer League Youth.

After a string of stand-out performances for the youth team, Kisnorbo was selected for the senior team, which was competing in the now defunct National Soccer League. Kisnorbo performed like a seasoned veteran and cemented his spot at centre back as a youngster ahead of more experienced players at the club. In his first season, Kisnorbo's performances led to South Melbourne winning the 2000-01 Premiership, 8 points ahead of second place.

In his secondary season, Kisnorbo performances led him to be awarded the Theo Marmaras medal for the best player at South Melbourne during the 2002 season.

Kisnorbo went on to make 67 appearances for the club and scored on 3 occasions. His big stature and toughness made him a fan-favourite to the Hellas fans and attracted international interest following his performances for the club.