Fat Footballers: Jeroen Verhoeven

Picture: www.picgifs.com.

One of the kings of fat footballers was born 34 years ago (1980) in Naarden, Netherlands: Jeroen Verhoeven !

Jeroen was formed in the prosperous Youth Sector of AFC Ajax, but in 1998, when he was 18, he moved to the Youth team of RKC Waalwijk, and two years later he was promoted to the First Team, but he never appeared in the League.

In 2002 he was signed by FC Volendam, for which he had played for seven season, collecting 152 appearances and being a regular starter both in Eerste Divisie (second tier), and Eredivisie (first tier), also serving as Captain.
His performances attracted the interest of AFC Ajax, that signed him back in 2009: he spent three season in Amsterdam being the third goalkeeper after Maarten Stekelenburg and Kenneth Vermeer, so playing just six matches in three years, all of them in 2010/11 Season (3 games in Eredivisie, 2 in Europa League and 1 in Dutch Cup).
In 2010/11 Europa League he played in the Second Leg of both Round of 32 (a 2-0 home win against Anderlecht, but qualification was already safe after First Leg) and Round of 16 (a 3-0 away defeat against Spartak Moskva)

In 2012 he was released by AFC Ajax, but he signed for another first tier club, FC Utrecht, becoming the back up for Robbin Ruiter: anyway Jeroen has managed to play few games in Eredivisie in every season (2 in 2012/13, 4 in 2013/14 and 1 in 2014/15 so far), plus few games in Beloften Eredivisie, the highest football league in for reserve teams.
In 2012/13 he played his first match of the season on the 7th of April against ADO Den Haag, replacing the injuried Ruiter at 81′, managing to keep a clean sheet, but in the following match he conceded 6 goals against AZ.
He appeared again on the pitch on the 18th of August for the third match of 2013/14 Eredivise, and he conceded again six goals, this time agains FC Twente (6-0), but things got better in the three following games, in which he conceded just two goals.

Jeroen is very tall (1,96 m), but he’s also very large (103 kgs), but, despite his body, he’s quite agile, as you can see in the video below: anyway he’s often mocked by opposite fans, that nicknamed him “Pizza man” and once, in 2010/11 Season, ADO Den Haag supporters shouted “Pizzaaa” everytime he touched the ball.

However he has won so far an Eerste Divisie (2007/08) with Volendam , and a KNVB Beker (the Dutch Cup, in 2009/10) with Ajax, and, despite almost never playing, he has been Dutch Champion twice, both with AFC Ajax (2010/11 and 2011/12).

The ones of you that were/are used to read/watch the manga/anime “Captain Tsubasa” have surely already noticed a great resemblance with Taichi Nakanishi (a.k.a. Teo Sellers), who plays for Norfolk and is the third or forth goalkeeper of Japanese National Team.

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