Wouterus Jacobus Antonius "Björn" van der Doelen (born 24 August 1976) is a Dutch former professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who played as a

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

Club career

Van der Doelen was born in

Goirle Goirle () is a municipality and town in the southern Netherlands, in the province of North Brabant. Part of the suburban area of the city of Tilburg, it shares with it its phone area code and public transport system. The municipality also includes ...

, Netherlands. He started his professional career for

PSV Eindhoven Philips Sport Vereniging (; en, Philips Sports Association ), abbreviated as PSV and internationally known as PSV Eindhoven (), is a Dutch sports club from Eindhoven, Netherlands. It is best known for its professional football department, whi ...

in the 1994–95 season in the Dutch highest league,

Eredivisie The Eredivisie (; ''"Honour Division"'' or ''"Premier Division"'') is the highest level of professional football in the Netherlands. The league was founded in 1956, two years after the start of professional football in the Netherlands. It is c ...

. Later on Van der Doelen played for

Standard Liège Royal Standard de Liège, commonly referred to as Standard Liège (; nl, Standard Luik ; german: Standard Lüttich ) or simply Standard in Belgium, is a Belgian professional football club based in the city of Liège. They are one of the most ...

(Belgium),

FC Twente Football Club Twente () is a Dutch professional football club from the city of Enschede, sometimes known internationally as Twente Enschede. The club was formed in 1965 by the merger of 1926 Dutch champions Sportclub Enschede with Enschedese Bo ...

and

NEC is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational information technology and electronics corporation, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo. The company was known as the Nippon Electric Company, Limited, before rebranding in 1983 as NEC. It prov ...

International career

He was a member of the Dutch squad at the

1995 FIFA World Youth Championship The 1995 FIFA World Youth Championship, known as the 1995 FIFA/Coca-Cola World Youth Championship for sponsorship purposes, was the 10th edition of the FIFA World Youth Championship. It was held in Qatar from 13 to 28 April 1995. The tournament too ...

Music career

In recent years, Van der Doelen started a career as singer/songwriter, first in the band Allez Soldaat, with band members Maarten van der Zanden (guitar), Steffen Pauws (bass) and Jules Fransen (drums). Later, using his own name.Henk lift mee met Björn van der Doelen
- Volkskrant He also made a song about the city

Nijmegen Nijmegen (;; Spanish and it, Nimega. Nijmeegs: ''Nimwèège'' ) is the largest city in the Dutch province of Gelderland and tenth largest of the Netherlands as a whole, located on the Waal river close to the German border. It is about 6 ...

, as a declaration of love for the city and for the club he loved most to play football for.

References

External links

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1976 births Living people People from Goirle Dutch footballers Footballers from North Brabant Association football midfielders Netherlands under-21 international footballers Netherlands youth international footballers PSV Eindhoven players Van Der Doelen Bjorn FC Twente players NEC Nijmegen players Eredivisie players Belgian Pro League players Dutch expatriate footballers Dutch expatriate sportspeople in Belgium Expatriate footballers in Belgium Dutch singer-songwriters 21st-century Dutch singers {{Netherlands-footy-midfielder-stub