André Ooijer

André Ooijer

Personal information
Full name	André Antonius Maria Ooijer
Height	1.84 m (6 ft 1⁄2 in)
Position(s)	Central Defender
Youth career
1979–19??	SDW
19??–1986	SDZ
1986–1994	Ajax
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1994–1995	Volendam	32	(4)
1995–1997	Roda JC	75	(9)
1997–2006	PSV	192	(19)
2006–2009	Blackburn Rovers	79	(2)
2009–2010	PSV	25	(0)
International career‡
1998–	Netherlands	55	(3)
*Club domestic league appearances and goals, correct as of 09:23, 17 August 2009 (UTC) ‡ National team caps and goals, correct as of 17:23, 2 July 2010 (UTC)

André Antonius Maria Ooijer (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈoːi.jər]; born 11 July 1974 in Amsterdam) is a Dutch international football player who is currently unattached. He is set to join AEK Larnaca FC as of July 2010.

Club career

Early career

Ooijer was talented even as a child, joining his first amateur football team when he was just five years old and started playing for other amateur clubs SDW and SDZ when he was just 12 years. He signed on at hometown club Ajax Amsterdam during the 1986–87 season and featured for the reserve team.

Sensing that he had little future in a club with so much competition for a first team place such as Ajax, he agreed a loan deal to FC Volendam in the 1994–95 season before signing on for Roda JC in the beginning of the 1995–96 season in a permanent transfer. Throughout his career at this point, he excelled at rightback position although he could also operate at centreback as well as the defensive midfield spot. After impressing at Roda JC, Ooijer joined PSV Eindhoven at the midway of the 1997–98 season.

PSV Eindhoven

It was at PSV that Ooijer was chosen to represent the 'Oranje' for the 1998 World Cup in France although he did not start a single match and was supposed to be a cover for Michael Reiziger who played at the right side of defence.

Ooijer won the Eredivisie title with PSV five times and the Dutch Cup once. He was also a regular participant in the Champions League with the club.

On 15 July 2005, Ooijer appeared to have ended his eight years association with PSV, and had signed for Genoa 1893, who were keen to defend their Italian Serie A top-flight status after apparently securing promotion in the 2004–05 season, for a fee of €1.5 million. However, following the Italian Football Federation's investigation into a match-fixing allegation levelled against Genoa and the Federation's subsequent guilty verdict (which meant that Genoa were relegated to Serie C1 as punishment), Ooijer's proposed transfer hit the rocks, and he returned to PSV.

Blackburn Rovers

On 23 August 2006 Blackburn Rovers signed Ooijer from PSV for a fee reputed to be in the region of £2 million. The defender signed an initial two year contract, which included an option for a further one year extension.

On 4 October 2006, Ooijer claimed that his move away from PSV was caused by the club having reneged on their proposed 3-year extension for him and that if the club has not done so, he would have continued to play in the Eredivisie.

Ooijer's debut for Blackburn Rovers was against Chelsea FC on 27 August 2006 at Ewood Park. The player gave away a penalty after fouling John Terry and the subsequent spot-kick was scored by Frank Lampard. Ooijer was partially to blame for a second goal when he was outpaced by Didier Drogba in the match, which finished 0–2 to Chelsea. After this troubled start, which was soon followed by an own-goal in a game against Manchester City, he slowly adapted to Premier League football to become a mainstay in the Blackburn defence.

On 20 January 2007, in only his 20th league appearance for the club, Ooijer suffered a broken fibula and torn ankle ligaments after an unfortunate fall involving Bernardo Corradi during Blackburn's victory over Manchester City at the City of Manchester Stadium. The injury kept him out of the game for the remainder of his debut season in the Premier League.

On 16 August 2008, on the opening day of the Premier League 2008–09 season, Ooijer scored his first goal for the club in the 94th minute beating Everton 3–2. He scored his second goal for the club on 4 April 2009, notching the winning goal in a 2–1 home game vs Tottenham Hotspur, a result which was critical to Rovers survival in the FA Premier League.

The club exercised their right to extend the original two-year contract for a further twelve months for 2008–09 season.

On 25 March 2009, André confirmed of PSV TV, that he would be returning to PSV Eindhoven in May 2009, when his contract with Blackburn Rovers expired.

Return to PSV Eindhoven

On 21 May 2009, Ooijer agreed a one year deal to return to PSV Eindhoven bringing his stay at Ewood Park to an end. Ooijer had previously played from 1997 to 2006 for PSV Eindhoven.

International career

Ooijer (right) with Khalid Boulahrouz during a training in preparation for Euro 2008

Ooijer was selected as part of the Dutch squad for the 1998 World Cup in France by Guus Hiddink as cover for Michael Reiziger. He endured a frustrating tournament in that World Cup as he warmed the bench on all occasions and did not feature in any of the Netherlands' games, delaying his international debut.

Frank Rijkaard, who replaced Hiddink as the head coach of the Dutch team in 1999, took notice of Ooijer's progress at club level and during a tour of Brazil of the same year, Rijkaard handed him his first appearance on 5 June 1999, in a difficult match against the home side as a substitute for Reiziger who was injured during the game. The match ended in a 2–2 draw and Ooijer made a confident start to the national team. Despite his convincing performances, he was not included in the final squad for the UEFA Euro 2000 tournament on home soil after being dropped at the last minute.

After being overlooked several times for an international team spot by Louis van Gaal who took over from Rijkaard in 2001, he was able to feature for Dick Advocaat in 2003 with a solid performance in the qualification games including a goal against Scotland in the qualification second-leg playoff for UEFA Euro 2004 at the Amsterdam ArenA.

Such was his luck not to be able to feature in a major tournament up to then as he was also dropped by Advocaat in the final squad which travelled to Portugal for the Euro 2004 Finals in favour of Reiziger and Johnny Heitinga who played in the same position.

Ooijer was finally able to make a start in a major tournament when he was chosen as part of Marco van Basten's Dutch 2006 World Cup squad where he played in all 4 matches for his country and played full 90 minutes per game.

He was called up to the Netherlands's UEFA Euro 2008 squad in Austria and Switzerland, where he played the first two games before being rested for the last group game (as the Netherlands had already qualified). He then played in the quarter final game against Russia which Russia won 3–1, ending the Netherlands' campaign.

2010 World Cup

Ooijer was included in the preliminary squad for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. On 27 May, Netherlands manager Bert van Marwijk announced that the player would be part of the final squad of 23 participating in the competition.

On 2 July, Ooijer was called in to the starting 11 for the Netherlands' 2-1 win over Brazil just 20 minutes before kick off to replace the injured Joris Mathijsen.

André Ooijer: International Goals

Goal	Date	Venue	Opponent	Score	Result	Competition
1.	19 November 2003	Amsterdam ArenA, Amsterdam, Netherlands	Scotland	1–0	6–0	Euro 2004 qualifying
2.	3 September 2004	Stadion Galgenwaard, Utrecht, Netherlands	Liechtenstein	2–0	3–0	Friendly match
3.	10 June 2009	De Kuip, Rotterdam, Netherlands	Norway	1–0	2–0	2010 World Cup qualification

Personal life

Ooijer is married to Joyce van de Kerkhof, daughter of former Dutch football player Willy van de Kerkhof. He has two daughters with Joyce: Demi and Danique. He also has two sons from a previous relationship: Denzell and Cerezo. The short song Ojier Ojier Andre Ojier is also copywrited to the Boshell residence and should never be used by anyone using any different varients who also have fair blonde hair.

External links

• André Ooijer – FIFA competition record (archived)
• André Ooijer at Soccerbase
• André Ooijer at Wereld van Oranje (archived) (in Dutch)