Carlos Saldaña joined Le Rouge ahead of the 2024 season and is preparing for his second year in Detroit. Last season, Saldaña started 15 matches for Detroit City across all competitions, including all the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup matches. In league play, Saldaña played a total of 1.080 minutes, only conceding nine goals. Perhaps the most memorable moment of his career so far was scoring the game-winning penalty against MLS side Houston Dynamo FC in the fourth round of the US Open Cup.
In September 2021, Saldaña returned to the United States, signed with Sacramento Republic FC in the USL Championship’s Western Conference, and remained there until the end of the 2023 season. During his time there, Saldaña started 22 matches, kept eight clean sheets, and made 66 saves.
A native of El Nayar, Nayarit, Mexico, Saldaña, age 28, moved to the United States early in life and attended the local De Anza Force Academy before joining the famous Guadalajara Academy to continue growing his skills. Between 2016 and 2019, Saldaña made 30 appearances for Guadalajara’s reserve team, leading them to the reserve league finals, only to fall on aggregate. Soon after the final, Liga Premier folded, forcing Chivas to discontinue their reserve team, leaving Saldaña to join Tepatitlán F.C. to play First Team football in 2019, making two appearances for the club.
