Daniël 'Dany' Verlinden (born 15 August 1963) is a Belgian retired 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 ...
who played as a
goalkeeper
In many team sports which involve scoring goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or intercepting o ...
.
Often referred to as ''De Muur'' ("the wall"), he spent most of his career at
Club Brugge, having played into his 40s. Dany is the father of
Thibaud Verlinden, he is playing at
FC DAC 1904
Club career
Verlinden was born in
Aarschot,
Flemish Brabant. Having arrived at
Club Brugge K.V. from
Lierse S.K. in 1988, he gained first-choice status in
his second year and, except for one season, never lost it again. He ranked the second most-capped player for the club in the
Belgian Pro League
The Belgian Pro League,(officially the Jupiler Pro League due to sponsorship reasons with Jupiler), is the top league competition for association football clubs in Belgium. Contested by 18 clubs since the 2020–21 season and reduced to 16 tea ...
, trailing only
Franky Van der Elst
Franky Van der Elst (born 30 April 1961) is a Belgian retired professional footballer who played as a defensive midfielder. He later worked as a manager.
During a 21-year professional career he played mainly with Club Brugge, being regarded as ...
, and was instrumental in the side's five league conquests (with the addition of as many
cups
CUPS (formerly an acronym for Common UNIX Printing System) is a modular printing system for Unix-like computer operating systems which allows a computer to act as a print server. A computer running CUPS is a host that can accept print jobs ...
and nine
supercups).
In December 2003, Verlinden became the oldest footballer ever to play in the
UEFA Champions League
The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competi ...
, aged 40 years and 116 days.
Alessandro Costacurta
Alessandro Costacurta (born 24 April 1966) is an Italian football pundit, manager and a former professional defender, who usually played as a centre back.
Throughout his club career, Costacurta spent over twenty years with AC Milan between 19 ...
of
A.C. Milan
Associazione Calcio Milan (), commonly referred to as AC Milan or simply Milan, is a professional Association football, football club in Milan, Italy, founded in 1899. The club has spent its entire history, with the exception of the 1980–81 ...
took over the record on 21 November 2006, when the
group_stage_
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#_One_or_more_competitions_held_at_a_single_venue_and_concen_...
_away_defeat_against_
group_stage_
A_tournament_is_a__competition_involving_at_least_three_competitors,_all_participating_in_a_sport_or__game._More_specifically,_the_term_may_be_used_in_either_of_two_overlapping_senses:
#_One_or_more_competitions_held_at_a_single_venue_and_concen_...