Sergio Ramón "El Checho" Ibarra (born January 11, 1973) is a retired Argentine footballer who played as a striker.
Although born in Argentina, Ibarra has played during almost all of his career in Peru, where he first moved at age 19 to join the ranks of Ciclista Lima in the first division, in 1992.
His biggest claim to fame was in 2004 when he won the Recopa against Boca Juniors as part of Cienciano. That same year the Argentine football magazine El Gráfico declared that he was the Argentine player who had scored the most goals worldwide (21), one more than Carlos Tevez, Andrés Silvera, and Luis Bonnet, and two more than Javier Saviola.[3]
On March 2, 2008, Ibarra broke the all-time scoring record in the Peruvian league, netting his 193rd goal in a 1–0 win over Cienciano. He is the Peruvian League Top Scorer with 226 goals.[4]
Ibarra is famous for scoring many goals despite having what many consider as very limited technical abilities. He is very often the top scorer of his team.
He is nicknamed "Checho", "Manteca" and/or "Shevchecho" after the famous Ukrainian footballer Andriy Shevchenko. He has obtained Peruvian nationality.
