Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink

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Personal information
Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink

Full name	Jan Johannes Vennegoor of Hesselink
Date of birth	November 7, 1978 (age 28)
Place of birth	Oldenzaal, Netherlands
Height	191 cm
Nickname	Big Jan
Playing position	Striker
Club information
Current club	Celtic
Senior clubs¹
Years	Club	App (Gls)*
1996-2001 2001-2006 2006-	FC Twente PSV Eindhoven Celtic	142 (59) 156 (72) 015 (10)
National team²
2000-	Netherlands	011 0(0)
¹ Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 21:32, 20 March 2007 (UTC). ² National team caps and goals correct as of 15 November 2006. * Appearances (Goals)

Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink (pronunciation (help·info)) (born November 7, 1978 in Oldenzaal) is a Dutch football player who currently plays for Scottish Premier League club Celtic. He plays in the position of striker. He stands at 191 cm and weighs 92 kg.

Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink scored 59 league goals for FC Twente over the course of five seasons. In the summer of 2001 he was signed up by PSV Eindhoven and quickly became accustomed to finding the net there too, scoring 22 goals in his first season.

However his second and third seasons at PSV proved less fruitful, since he scored only 8 and 12 goals respectively. At the end of the 2003-04 season, he was told he could leave the club. However he stayed on, and in 2004-05, Vennegoor of Hesselink was in excellent form, scoring 19 goals in 28 matches. He also earned a re-call to the Dutch national team in March 2005 after an absence of four and a half years. He made his debut for the Dutch national team on 11 October 2000 against Portugal. He has played in the 2006 World Cup making a late appearance as a substitute in the second-round game against Portugal. Currently Vennegoor of Hesselink is a regular call-up for the national team and plays the role as reserve striker.

On August 24, Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink left PSV and signed a 3 year deal with Scottish champions Celtic, with the option of a further year, for a fee of around £3.4m ^[1]. He scored on his debut after coming on as a substitute against Hibernian. In his next game, against Aberdeen, he scored the winner from outside the box in a 1-0 win. He then scored his first European goal for Celtic in the Champions League against Manchester United. Injuries have subsequently curtailed his appearances but he has recently come onto some form, scoring his first hat-trick for the Bhoys against St. Mirren and a last minute winner against Inverness Caledonian Thistle, before getting sent off with a second booking, after leaving the field of play to celebrate with the Celtic fans.

[edit] Trivia

His name - the longest in European football - derives from the 17th Century, when two farming families in the Enschede area of Holland intermarried. Both the Vennegoor and Hesselink names carried equal social weight, and so - rather than choose between them - they chose to use both. "Of" in Dutch translates to "or" in English, which would mean that a strict translation of his name would read 'Jan Vennegoor or Hesselink' ^[2]
He has an eight month old son with his current partner who can also carry both surnames. If he had a daughter she would be unable to carry both surnames. Jan's sister is unable to carry both names as well

[edit] References

^ "Dutch striker signs up for Celtic", The BBC, 24-8-2006.
^ "Lost and found in the international wilderness", The Guardian, 30-8-2006.

[edit] External links

	Netherlands squad - 2006 FIFA World Cup
1 van der Sar \| 2 Jaliens \| 3 Boulahrouz \| 4 Mathijsen \| 5 van Bronckhorst \| 6 Landzaat \| 7 Kuyt \| 8 Cocu \| 9 van Nistelrooy \| 10 van der Vaart \| 11 Robben \| 12 Kromkamp \| 13 Ooijer \| 14 Heitinga \| 15 de Cler \| 16 Maduro \| 17 van Persie \| 18 van Bommel \| 19 Vennegoor of Hesselink \| 20 Sneijder \| 21 Babel \| 22 Timmer \| 23 Stekelenburg \| Coach: van Basten