Per Lundgren Nielsen (; born 15 October 1973) is a Danish 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 in the central defense of

Brøndby IF Brøndbyernes Idrætsforening (, usually abbreviated to Brøndby IF (), is a professional association football club based in Brøndbyvester, Capital Region of Denmark. The club was founded in 1964 as a merger between two local clubs and was p ...

in the

Danish Superliga The Danish Superliga ( da, Superligaen, ) is the current Danish football championship tournament, and administered by the Danish Football Association. It is the highest football league in Denmark and is currently contested by 12 teams each yea ...

for his entire club career. With Brøndby, Nielsen won five Danish championships and three

Danish Cup The Danish Cup ( da, Landspokalturneringen; often referred to as Pokalen) is the official "knockout" cup competition in Danish football, run by the Danish Football Association. The cup has been contested annually since 1955. The winner will quali ...

s since his senior debut in 1993. He played 547 official games for Brøndby IF and scored 26 goals, and from 2002 to 2008 he was named

team captain In team sport, captain is a title given to a member of the team. The title is frequently honorary, but in some cases the captain may have significant responsibility for strategy and teamwork while the game is in progress on the field. In eithe ...

. He played 10 matches for the

Denmark national football team The Denmark men's national football team ( da, Danmarks herre-fodboldlandshold or ''herrelandsholdet'') represents Denmark in men's international football competitions. It is controlled by the Danish Football Association (DBU), the governing bo ...

and is noted for 19 matches for the national under-21 team from 1994 to 1996. Following his retirement, he has worked as first as an assistant coach, later as head coach. Since 2015 he has been coaching Brøndby's women's team.

Club career

Born in

Århus Aarhus (, , ; officially spelled Århus from 1948 until 1 January 2011) is the second-largest city in Denmark and the seat of Aarhus Municipality. It is located on the eastern shore of Jutland in the Kattegat sea and approximately northwest ...

,Per Nielsen
at Haslund.info Nielsen's parents moved to Brøndby when he was a child, and he enrolled at Brøndby IF at the age of five.Brøndby IF profile
Nielsen made his senior debut in the Brøndby IF jersey on 26 June 1993, and debuted in the

championship in March 1995. Nielsen was touted as the long-term successor of central defender

Uche Okechukwu Uchechukwu Alozie “Uche” Okechukwu also known as Deniz Uygar (born 27 September 1967) is a Nigerian former professional footballer who played as a central defender. "Uchechukwu" is an Igbo name meaning "God´s will". He was also honoured a ...

and was permanently moved into the senior squad in December 1993, coming from a Brøndby youth team that included several future first team regulars, including

Kim Daugaard Kim Daugaard Hansen (; born 29 March 1974) is a Danish football coach and former professional player, who currently works as assistant coach HB Køge. He played as a midfielder for Brøndby IF for his entire career.

, Allan Ravn and later Danish national team player

Ebbe Sand Ebbe Sand (; born 19 July 1972) is a former professional footballer from Denmark who played as a forward for Brøndby IF in Denmark and FC Schalke 04 in Germany. He was the Bundesliga top scorer in 2001, and won the DFB-Pokal in 2001 and 2002 wi ...

. Nielsen became a mainstay in the team during the 1995–96 Superliga season,Per Lundgren Nielsen
at DanskFodbold.com as Brøndby won the Danish championship, and established himself as a regular starter. He helped Brøndby repeat the Superliga win in the 1996–97 Superliga and the Double of both Superliga championship and

title in 1998. Following the 2001–02 Superliga championship triumph with Brøndby, Danish international

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 ...

Mogens Krogh Mogens Krogh (; born 31 October 1963) is a Danish former professional football player who was most recently manager of Næstved BK. In his playing career, Krogh was the first choice goalkeeper of Ikast fS between 1981 and 1991 and of Brøndby f ...

retired, and Nielsen was chosen as new

. After his second Danish Cup triumph in 2003, Nielsen was elected the 2003 Brøndby IF ''Player of the Year''.Årets Spiller
at

In 2004, the Danish football players' association announced a

strike action Strike action, also called labor strike, labour strike, or simply strike, is a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal of employees to Labor (economics), work. A strike usually takes place in response to grievance (labour), employee grievance ...

. Brøndby was still in European competition, and would be forced to field a team consisting of retired Brøndby professionals, youth team players and recent signings who had yet to become members of the players' association, in the August 2004

UEFA Cup A cup is an open-top used to hold hot or cold liquids for pouring or drinking; while mainly used for drinking, it also can be used to store Solid, solids for pouring (e.g., sugar, flour, grains, salt). Cups may be made of glass, metal, porcela ...

qualification re-match against

FK Ventspils FK Ventspils is a Latvian football club, based at Ventspils Olimpiskais Stadions in Ventspils city and is one of the most popular football clubs in the country. The club played in the Latvian Virsliga since 1997. It was abolished in 2020, but h ...

. Two days before the match, Nielsen and teammate Dan Anton Johansen broke the strike and returned to the Brøndby training, causing a lot of controversy in the process. The day after, the players' and football clubs' associations reached a provisorical agreement, and Brøndby's first team players were selected for the match, though they were eliminated on aggregate. He captained Brøndby to the Double of the 2004–05 Superliga and Danish Cup titles, and was named 2006 Brøndby IF ''Player of the Year''. In February 2008, Nielsen chose to resign from the position of

, stating that he would spend his remaining one and a half years at Brøndby helping the club move on, also if that meant him taking a place on the bench.

Stefán Gíslason Stefán Gíslason (born 15 March 1980 in Fjarðabyggð) is an Icelandic retired footballer and manager who last played for Breiðablik in the Icelandic Premier League as a defensive midfielder. He is currently managing Søgne in the Norwegian Fo ...

was named his successor. Nielsen helped Brøndby win the 2008 Danish Cup, his last trophy with the team. Nielsen announced that he would retire as an active footballer in late June 2008. Instead he will continue as a scout in Brøndby. His last game in the blue and yellow jersey was his

testimonial match A testimonial match or testimonial game, often referred to simply as a testimonial, is a practice in some sports, particularly in association football in the United Kingdom and South America, where a club has a match to honour a player for servic ...

against Spanish team

Deportivo La Coruna ''Deportivo'' (Spanish, 'sporting') may refer to: * Deportivo de La Coruña, commonly known as simply Deportivo, a Spanish football club * Déportivo, a French rock band * Deportivo (Mexicable), an aerial lift station in Ecatepec, Mexico * Deport ...

on 12 July 2008. Nielsen played a total 547 games in all competitions, including 394 games and scored 23 goals for Brøndby in the Superliga.

Coaching career

Following three years Brondby IF youth coach, he spent four years as Hvidovre IF head coach. In 2015, he took over as coach for Danish women's champions Brondby IF. In April 2019 Per Nielsen prolonged his contract with Brondby IF so that he would stay with the team until 2021. The team won the championship in 2019.

International career

Nielsen's first international game was a single under-19 national team match in December 1993. He was called up to play for the Danish national under-21 team in March 1994, and went on to play 19 games and score two goals for the under-21 national team until July 1996.Per Nielsen – Alle hold (Alle kampe)
at

Danish Football Association The Danish Football Union ( da, Dansk Boldspil-Union; DBU) is the governing body of football in Denmark. It is the organization of the Danish football clubs and runs the professional Danish football leagues and the men's and women's national t ...

Despite winning several trophies with Brøndby, Nielsen never broke into the Danish national team, but he was selected to play for the league national team, consisting of the best players from the domestic Danish Superliga championship. He went on his first trip with the league national team in 1997, playing three games at the US Cup in

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, United States.Per Nielsen – Ligalandshold (Alle uofficielle kampe)
at

He likewise took part in the league national team campaign in Colombia, Ecuador and Venezuela in 1999, with injuries forcing him out of the 1998 tour. Nielsen was once again included in the Danish league national team's trip to California in 2004, where he made his 10th and last appearance for the team, with injuries forcing him out of the 2003 tour. In January 2006, Nielsen was called up for his sixth trip with the Danish league national team. However, he chose not to travel with the team to the

Carlsberg Cup Carlsberg may refer to: Places * Carlsberg (district), a district in Copenhagen, Denmark ** Carlsberg station, its train station * Carlsberg, Germany, a municipality in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany * Carlsberg Fjord, Greenland Other uses * Carlsbe ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

, citing personal reasons, which national team coach

Morten Olsen Morten Per Olsen (born 14 August 1949) is a Danish football manager and former player. He was the head coach of the Denmark national team for 15 years from 2000 until 2015, guiding Denmark to the 2002 FIFA World Cup, 2004 European Championshi ...

fully supported.Ligalandsholds-afbud fra Per Nielsen

DBU The decibel (symbol: dB) is a relative unit of measurement equal to one tenth of a bel (B). It expresses the ratio of two values of a Power, root-power, and field quantities, power or root-power quantity on a logarithmic scale. Two signals whose ...

, 5 January 2006. Nielsen finally debuted for the Danish national team in September 2002 as a late substitute, and he would go on to be among the fringe players of the Danish squad. He played a total 10 national team games until November 2006, helping Denmark qualify for the 2004 European Championship.

Honours

Player

: 1995–96, 1996–97, 1997–98, 2001–02, 2004–05 *

: 1997–98, 2002–03, 2004–05, 2007–08 * Brøndby IF ''Player of the Year'': 2003, 2006

Manager

* Danish Women League: 2015, 2017, 2019

References

External links

Danish national team profile

Brøndby IF profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nielsen, Per 1973 births Living people Danish men's footballers Danish Superliga players Brøndby IF players Denmark men's international footballers Denmark men's under-21 international footballers Footballers from Aarhus Men's association football defenders Elitedivisionen managers Brøndby IF non-playing staff