Fortuna Sittard

Fortuna Sittard (; ) is a professional football club from the municipality of Sittard-Geleen, Netherlands. The club currently plays its football in the 12,500 capacity Fortuna Sittard Stadion and features in the Eredivisie. The club was established through a merger of former clubs Fortuna 54 and Sittardia, which merged as the Fortuna Sittardia Combinatie on 1 July 1968.

History

The club experienced mixed fortunes throughout its history, although it was a regular fixture in the Eredivisie in the 1990s, with players such as Kevin Hofland, Mark van Bommel and Fernando Ricksen emerging from its youth system. These players later joined PSV Eindhoven and Rangers and played for the Netherlands national team. The team also signed Wilfred Bouma and Patrick Paauwe from the youth setup of PSV. Both players developed under manager Bert van Marwijk before joining the Dutch national side and moving to bigger clubs.

Fortuna 54 won the KNVB Cup in the 1956–57 season and finished the Eredivisie season in second place behind champions Ajax. Sittardia were less successful and battled against relegation for many seasons. Fortuna 54 won the KNVB Cup again in 1964 before the merging of the two clubs in 1968, due to financial difficulties.

At the end of the 1999–2000 season, manager Bert van Marwijk left to join Feyenoord, and the team was relegated to the Eerste Divisie in the 2001–02 season.

Financial difficulties (2002–16)

Financial irregularities were discovered, and the team faced bankruptcy over several seasons. In the winter of 2003, two of the club's fans won the Dutch lottery and donated all of the prize money to the club. The club cleared most of its debts by selling off its new stadium, the Wagner & Partners stadium.

On 19 May 2009, the KNVB announced it would withdraw the club's license to play for the 2010–11 season. After going to civil court, this decision was revoked. Despite ongoing financial difficulties, the club gradually began to recover financially in the following years, leading to improved results. In the 2011–12 season, Fortuna Sittard narrowly missed out on qualifying for the playoffs for promotion to Eredivisie, conceding an equaliser in the final seconds of the season in a home match against the Go Ahead Eagles, resulting in the Eagles taking the final playoff spot instead. Although the club qualified for the playoffs in the 2012–13 and 2013–14 seasons, offering them a chance to return to Eredivisie since relegation in 2002, Fortuna was unsuccessful in both first-round matches against De Graafschap.

Takeover and Eredivisie (2016–present)

The club again faced financial troubles in 2016, leading to its takeover by Turkish investor Işıtan Gün, who previously served as the chief operating officer of Galatasaray. The 2016–17 season was a tough start for the club, but it managed to avoid relegation after changing coaches and recruiting new players, including some from Galatasaray.

In December 2016, Sunday Oliseh was appointed as the new coach of Fortuna Sittard. During his time as coach, he set two new records for the club, with eight consecutive home victories and the biggest away victory in the club's history, against Telstar by a score of 6–0. In January 2018, the team won a '' periodetitel'' after a 2–1 victory over Jong Ajax. However, on 14 February 2018, Oliseh was suspended due to "repeated and culpable actions towards multiple individuals within the organisation over an extended period," according to a statement on the club's website announcing his release. Oliseh posted online that he was suspended due to his "refusal to participate in Illegal activities."

In 2018, after 16 years in the Eerste Divisie, Fortuna won promotion to the Eredivisie again after beating Jong PSV 1–0 to stay clear from NEC and finishing runner-up to champions Jong Ajax, which cannot be promoted.

Fortuna Sittard finished in 16th place during the 2019–20 season. However, because the season was suspended and declared void due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the club remained in the Eredivisie for the 2020–21 season. After that reprieve, the club finished in 11th place that season. The following year, Fortuna Sittard finished 15th, just one point clear of the relegation playoff. Since then, the club's results have placed it more comfortably in the mid-table. Fortuna Sittard finished in 13th place in the 2022–23 season and 10th place in the 2023–24 season.

Honours

* KNVB Cup
** Winners: 1956–57, 1963–64
** Runners-up: 1983–84, 1998–99
* Eerste Divisie
** Winners: 1958–59, 1963–64, 1965–66, 1994–95
** Promoted: 1981–82, 2017–18

International

Totals

Results

ImageSize = width:800 height:60
PlotArea = left:10 right:10 bottom:30 top:10
TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal format:yyyy
DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy
Period = from:01/01/1990 till:01/01/2024
ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:1 start:1990
Colors =
id:bl1 value:rgb(0.9,0.9,0.3)
id:bl2 value:rgb(0.5,0.8,0.5)
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id:rn value:rgb(0.9,0.1,0.1)

PlotData=
bar:Position width:15 color:white align:center

from:01/01/1990 till:01/01/1991 shift:(0,-4) text:12
from:01/01/1991 till:01/01/1992 shift:(0,-4) text:14
from:01/01/1992 till:01/01/1993 shift:(0,-4) text:16
from:01/01/1993 till:01/01/1994 shift:(0,-4) text:10
from:01/01/1994 till:01/01/1995 shift:(0,-4) text:1
from:01/01/1995 till:01/01/1996 shift:(0,-4) text:13
from:01/01/1996 till:01/01/1997 shift:(0,-4) text:11
from:01/01/1997 till:01/01/1998 shift:(0,-4) text:7
from:01/01/1998 till:01/01/1999 shift:(0,-4) text:10
from:01/01/1999 till:01/01/2000 shift:(0,-4) text:12
from:01/01/2000 till:01/01/2001 shift:(0,-4) text:16
from:01/01/2001 till:01/01/2002 shift:(0,-4) text:18
from:01/01/2002 till:01/01/2003 shift:(0,-4) text:15
from:01/01/2003 till:01/01/2004 shift:(0,-4) text:19
from:01/01/2004 till:01/01/2005 shift:(0,-4) text:19
from:01/01/2005 till:01/01/2006 shift:(0,-4) text:20
from:01/01/2006 till:01/01/2007 shift:(0,-4) text:15
from:01/01/2007 till:01/01/2008 shift:(0,-4) text:16
from:01/01/2008 till:01/01/2009 shift:(0,-4) text:15
from:01/01/2009 till:01/01/2010 shift:(0,-4) text:17
from:01/01/2010 till:01/01/2011 shift:(0,-4) text:16
from:01/01/2011 till:01/01/2012 shift:(0,-4) text:11
from:01/01/2012 till:01/01/2013 shift:(0,-4) text:7
from:01/01/2013 till:01/01/2014 shift:(0,-4) text:8
from:01/01/2014 till:01/01/2015 shift:(0,-4) text:19
from:01/01/2015 till:01/01/2016 shift:(0,-4) text:16
from:01/01/2016 till:01/01/2017 shift:(0,-4) text:17
from:01/01/2017 till:01/01/2018 shift:(0,-4) text:2
from:01/01/2018 till:01/01/2019 shift:(0,-4) text:15
from:01/01/2019 till:01/01/2020 shift:(0,-4) text:-
from:01/01/2020 till:01/01/2021 shift:(0,-4) text:11
from:01/01/2021 till:01/01/2022 shift:(0,-4) text:15
from:01/01/2022 till:01/01/2023 shift:(0,-4) text:13
from:01/01/2023 till:01/01/2024 shift:(0,-4) text:10

from:01/01/1990 till:01/01/1993 color:bl2 shift:(0,13) text: "Eredivisie"
from:01/01/1993 till:01/01/1995 color:bl1 shift:(0,13) text: "Eerste Divisie"
from:01/01/1995 till:01/01/2002 color:bl2 shift:(0,13) text: "Eredivisie"
from:01/01/2002 till:01/01/2018 color:bl1 shift:(0,13) text: "Eerste Divisie"
from:01/01/2018 till:01/01/2024 color:bl2 shift:(0,13) text: "Eredivisie"

Below is a table with Fortuna Sittard's domestic results since the introduction of professional football in 1956.

Players

Current squad

Out on loan

Former players

National team players

''The following players were called up to represent their national teams in international football and received caps during their tenure with Fortuna Sittard:The following is a consolidated list of clubs' ''RKSV Sittardia'', ''Fortuna '54'' and ''Fortuna Sittard'', as a result of the merger of the two prior aforementioned clubs in 1968.

*;Cape Verde
** Deroy Duarte (2021–2024)
** Lisandro Semedo (2017–2022)
*;DR Congo
** Samuel Moutoussamy (2020–2021)
*;Finland
** Rasmus Karjalainen (2019–2021)
*;Greece
** Lazaros Rota (2020–2021)
*;Kosovo
** Arianit Ferati (2021–2024)
*;Luxembourg
** Antoine Kohn (1959–1963; 1964–1965)
*;Moldova
** Vitalie Damașcan (2019–2020)
** Alexei Koșelev (2018–2021)

*;Netherlands
** Henk Angenent (1954–1962)
** Bram Appel (1948–1949; 1955–1960)
** Bart Carlier (1955–1958; 1964–1965)
** Willy Dullens (1963–1969)
** Gerard Gruisen (1951–1969)
** Cor van der Hart (1954–1966)
** Wim Koevermans (1980–1988)
** Frans de Munck (1954–1957)
** Jan Notermans (1955–1965)
** Willy Quaedackers (1961–1966)
** Wilbert Suvrijn (1981–1986)
** Faas Wilkes (1959–1962)
*;New Zealand
** Fred de Jong (1990–1993)
*;North Macedonia
** Stefan Ashkovski (2016–2018)

*;Northern Ireland
** Phil Gray (1996–1997)
*;Slovakia
** Branislav Niňaj (2018–2021)
*;Suriname
** Justin Lonwijk (2024)
** Gavin Vlijter (2015–2019)
*;Sweden
** Tesfaldet Tekie (2019–2022)
*;Togo
** Sadik Fofana (2023–2024)
*;Turkey
** Burak Yılmaz (2022–2023)

* ''Players in bold actively play for Fortuna Sittard and for their respective national teams. Years in brackets indicate careerspan with Fortuna Sittard.''

National team players by Confederation

Member associations are listed in order of most to least amount of current and former Fortuna Sittard players represented Internationally

Players in international tournaments

The following is a list of Fortuna Sittard players who have competed in international tournaments, including the Africa Cup of Nations. To this date no Fortuna Sittard players have participated in the FIFA World Cup, UEFA European Championship, CONCACAF Gold Cup, AFC Asian Cup, Copa América or the OFC Nations Cup while playing for Fortuna Sittard.

Club staff

Coaches

;As Fortuna '54
* 1956–57: Friedrich Donenfeld (vice champion, cup winner)
* 1957–58: Bram Appel
* 1958–59: Harry Verhardt
* 1959–61: Friedrich Donenfeld
* 1961–63: Jung Schlangen
* 1963–65: Wim Latten (cup winner 1964)
* 1965–66: Max Schirschin
* 1966–67: Karl-Heinz Marotzke
* 1967–68: Bram Appel

;As Sittardia
* Frans Debruyn
* Vladimir Beara (1966–1968)
* Frans Debruyn (1968)

;As Fortuna Sittard
* Frans Debruyn (1968–69)
* Henk Reuvers (1969–70)
* Evert Teunissen (1970–72)
* Cor Brom (1972–76)
* Cor van der Hart (1976–77)
* Joop Castenmiller (1977–80)
* Frans Körver (1980–84)
* Bert Jacobs (1984–87)
* Hans van Doorneveld (1987–89)
* Han Berger (1989–91)
* Georg Keßler (1991–92)
* Chris Dekker (1992–94)
* Pim Verbeek (1994–97)
* Bert van Marwijk (1997–00)
* Henk Duut (2000–01)
* Frans Thijssen (2000–01)
* Hans Verèl (2001)
* Hans de Koning (2001–04)
* Chris Dekker (2004–06)
* Frans Körver (2006–07)

* Henk Wisman (2007)
* Roger Reijners (2007–10)
* Wim Dusseldorp (2010–11)
* Tini Ruys (2011–12)
* Willy Boessen (2012–14)
* Peter van Vossen (2014–15)
* Ben van Dael (2015–16)
* Sunday Oliseh (2017–18)
* Claudio Braga (''a.i.'') (2018)
* René Eijer (2018–19)
* Sjors Ultee (2019–20)
* Kevin Hofland (2020)
* Sjors Ultee (2020–2022)
* Julio Velazquez (2022–2023)
* Danny Buijs (2023–present)

Women's football

In January 2022, Fortuna announced it was beginning a women's football department. The club started playing in the women's Eredivisie in the 2022–23 season. In its first season, the club finished third out of 11 teams. In the 2023–24 season, Fortuna finished in fourth place out of 12 teams, and forward Tessa Wullaert was the top goal scorer and Player of the Year. However, prior to the 2024–25 season, the club announced it had not generated sufficient revenue from the women's team and cut its player spending, with Wullaert, Alieke Tuin, and other players departing for new clubs.

See also

* Dutch football league teams

References

Notes

External links

*
Fansite Fortuna Supporters Collectief

{{KNVB Cup Winners 1961-present

Association football clubs established in 1968
1968 establishments in the Netherlands
Football clubs in the Netherlands
Football clubs in Limburg (Netherlands)
Sports clubs and teams in Sittard-Geleen
South Limburg (Netherlands)