Patrick Olaiya Olukayode Owomoyela (; born 5 November 1979) is a German 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 ...

Nigeria Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf o ...

n descent who played mainly as a

right-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield position whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Centre-backs are usually positioned in pairs, with one full-back on either s ...

. He previously played for

Lüneburger SK Lüneburger Sport-Klub von 1901 e. V. was one of the oldest and most successful football clubs from the Lüneburg area until it merged with Lüneburger SV in 2008 to become Lüneburger SK Hansa. History The club was established on 1 April 1901 ...

VfL Osnabrück VfL Osnabrück is a German multi-sport club in Osnabrück, Lower Saxony. It currently fields teams in basketball, gymnastics, swimming, table tennis, and tennis but is by far best known for its football section. History Foundation to WW2 The c ...

SC Paderborn 07 Sport-Club Paderborn 07 e.V., commonly known as simply SC Paderborn 07 () or SC Paderborn, is a German association football club based in Paderborn, North Rhine-Westphalia. The club has enjoyed its greatest successes since the turn of the mille ...

, Arminia Bielefeld, SV Werder Bremen,

Borussia Dortmund Ballspielverein Borussia 09 e. V. Dortmund, commonly known as Borussia Dortmund (), BVB (), or simply Dortmund (), is a German professional sports club based in Dortmund, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is best known for its men's professional fo ...

and

Hamburger SV II Hamburger SV II are the reserve team of German association football club Hamburger SV. Until 2005 the team played as Hamburger SV Amateure. The team has qualified for the first round of the DFB-Pokal, the German Cup, on five occasions. They cur ...

. He was

capped In sport, a cap is a player's appearance in a game at international level. The term dates from the practice in the United Kingdom of awarding a cap to every player in an international match of rugby football and association football. In the ea ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

at international level and was a member of the squad at the 2005 FIFA Confederations Cup.

Club career

Owomoyela began his career in lower league German football. In 2003, he made the step up to Arminia Bielefeld, then in the

2. Bundesliga The 2. Bundesliga ( ) is the second division of professional football in Germany. It was implemented 11 years after the founding of the Fußball-Bundesliga as the new second division for professional football. The 2. Bundesliga is ranked below ...

. Great performances for Bielefeld in the 2004–05 season earned Owomoyela interest from German top clubs, and ahead of the 2005–06 season, he joined SV Werder Bremen. In his first season, Owomoyela was the undisputed starter at

right back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield position whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Centre-backs are usually positioned in pairs, with one full-back on either s ...

and helped Bremen reach second in the

Bundesliga The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany. At the top of the German football league system, the Bundesliga is Germany's primary footba ...

. With the arrival of

Clemens Fritz Clemens Fritz (born 7 December 1980) is a German former professional footballer who played as a right-back and as a defensive midfielder. He is mostly known for his 11-year spell at Werder Bremen. Having begun his career at Rot-Weiß Erfurt an ...

the following season, however, he lost his starting position due to injuries and bad displays. Owomoyela was finally transferred to

at the beginning of the 2008–09 season, where he looked to reestablish himself in German top-flight football.

International career

Owomoyela debuted for

Jürgen Klinsmann Jürgen Klinsmann (, born 30 July 1964) is a German professional football manager and former player. Klinsmann played for several prominent clubs in Europe including VfB Stuttgart, Inter Milan, Monaco, Tottenham Hotspur, and Bayern Munich. He ...

's Germany national side in an Asian tour, playing 90 minutes in a 3–0 win over Japan, on 16 December 2004, in

Yokohama is the second-largest city in Japan by population and the most populous municipality of Japan. It is the capital city and the most populous city in Kanagawa Prefecture, with a 2020 population of 3.8 million. It lies on Tokyo Bay, south of T ...

. He later was selected in the ''Bundestrainers team for the

Confederations Cup The FIFA Confederations Cup was an international association football tournament for men's national teams, held every four years by FIFA. It was contested by the holders of each of the six continental championships (AFC, CAF, CONCACAF, CONMEBOL, ...

in 2005, but was unused there and was finally overlooked for Germany's

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the concept i ...

final squad. In total he collected eleven caps.

Post-retirement

Following his retirement, Owomoyela became an

English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the ...

commentator for Bundesliga and DFB-Pokal international broadcasts.

Personal life

In addition to his football skills, Owomoyela is also a

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

player, having played in the German regional league before switching to football full-time. He was born to a German people, German mother and a

n father. His name "Olukayode" stems from the Yoruba names, Yoruba words "Olu", a diminutive form of "Oluwa" or Olorun meaning "God" and "Kayode" meaning "to bring joy", which translates to "God brings me joy and happiness". In 2021, Owomoyela featured in ', a documentary detailing the experiences of Black people, Black players in German professional football.

Career statistics

Club

International

Honours

Werder Bremen *DFL-Ligapokal: 2006 DFL-Ligapokal, 2006 Borussia Dortmund *

: 2010–11 Bundesliga, 2010–11, 2011–12 Bundesliga, 2011–12 * DFB-Pokal: 2011–12 DFB-Pokal, 2011–12

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Owomoyela, Patrick 1979 births Living people Footballers from Hamburg German footballers Association football fullbacks Germany international footballers 2005 FIFA Confederations Cup players Bundesliga players 2. Bundesliga players 3. Liga players Lüneburger SK players VfL Osnabrück players SC Paderborn 07 players Arminia Bielefeld players SV Werder Bremen players Borussia Dortmund players Borussia Dortmund II players German sportspeople of Nigerian descent German people of Yoruba descent Yoruba sportspeople Borussia Dortmund non-playing staff