The Royal Dutch Football Association (, ; KNVB ) is the governing body of

football in the Netherlands Football is the most popular sport in the Netherlands. Football was introduced to the Netherlands by Pim Mulier in the 19th century when in 1879, at the age of 14, he founded Haarlemsche Football Club. Over the next 30 years, football gained ...

. It organises the main Dutch football leagues (

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 ...

and

Eerste Divisie The Eerste Divisie (, en, First Division) is the second-highest tier of football in the Netherlands. It is linked with the top-level Eredivisie and with the third-level Tweede Divisie via promotion/relegation systems. It is also known as the ...

), the amateur leagues, the

KNVB Cup The KNVB Beker (; en, KNVB Cup), branded as the TOTO KNVB Beker for sponsorship reasons, is a competition in the Netherlands organized by the Royal Dutch Football Association (KNVB) since 1898. It was based on the format of the English FA Cup. Ou ...

, and the Dutch men's and

women's A woman is an adult female human. Prior to adulthood, a female human is referred to as a girl (a female child or adolescent). The plural ''women'' is sometimes used in certain phrases such as "women's rights" to denote female humans regardl ...

national teams. For three seasons in the 2010s, the KNVB and its Belgian counterpart operated a joint top-level women's league, the

BeNe League The BeNe League was the highest women's football league in Belgium and the Netherlands. To increase competitiveness in their national leagues, the BeNe League was a joint cooperation between the Royal Belgian Football Association and the Royal Du ...

, until the two countries dissolved the league after the 2014–15 season and re-established their own top-level leagues. The KNVB is based in the central municipality of

Zeist Zeist () is the capital and largest town of the municipality of Zeist. The town is located in the Utrecht province of the Netherlands, east of the city of Utrecht. History The town of "Seist" was first mentioned in a charter in the year 83 ...

. With over 1.2 million members the KNVB is the single largest sports association in the Netherlands.

History

In 1889, the Nederlandse Voetbal en Athletiek Bond was founded. Due to certain disagreements several football clubs ended their association with it and together to form Koninklijke Nederlandse Voetbalbond (KNVB) which was later renamed to present name. It was one of the founding members of

FIFA FIFA (; stands for ''Fédération Internationale de Football Association'' ( French), meaning International Association Football Federation ) is the international governing body of association football, beach football and futsal. It was found ...

in 1904 and one of the first non-British football association in Europe. The first Dutch football club was formed in 1879 in

Haarlem Haarlem (; predecessor of ''Harlem'' in English) is a city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is the capital of the province of North Holland. Haarlem is situated at the northern edge of the Randstad, one of the most populated metropoli ...

. The

Netherlands Football League Championship 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 ...

had already existed for a decade unofficially when the association was founded. The KNVB strongly disapproved the professionalism of football in 1909. It said that "it will protest against it by all means necessary." In 2012 KNVB launched an 11-point action plan, called 'Football for Everyone' to promote gay football players in

coming out Coming out of the closet, often shortened to coming out, is a metaphor used to describe LGBT people's self-disclosure of their sexual orientation, romantic orientation, or gender identity. Framed and debated as a privacy issue, coming out of ...

. It released a 30-second video named 'Gay? It doesn't matter'; prepared by broadcaster BNN. The video was also broadcast during the Dutch national football teams World Cup qualifier match against Andorra held in October 2012. During the

2014 FIFA World Cup The 2014 FIFA World Cup was the 20th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for men's national football teams organised by FIFA. It took place in Brazil from 12 June to 13 July 2014, after the country was awarded the hosting ri ...

, it collaborated with Royal Philips to open six football clinics across Brazil. Bert van Oostveen is the current Secretary-General of KNVB.

Management

Current sponsorships

* Nike * ING Group * Heineken * Coca-Cola * PricewaterhouseCoopers *

Staatsloterij A lottery is a form of gambling which involves the drawing of lots for a prize. Lottery is outlawed by some governments, while others endorse it to the extent of organizing a national or state lottery. It is common to find some degree of regulation ...

* KPN * Adecco * Volkswagen

References

External links

*
KNVB.com – official website in English

OnsOranje.nl – website of the Netherlands national football team

Netherlands National Football Team History
at VoetbalStats.nl

at FIFA site

at UEFA site {{Use dmy dates, date=January 2021 Dutch Football in the Netherlands

Football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

Organisations based in the Netherlands with royal patronage 1889 establishments in the Netherlands Sports organizations established in 1889 Organisations based in Utrecht (province) Sport in Zeist

History

Management

Current sponsorships

See also

References

External links