Johannes "Hans" Segers (born 30 October 1961) is a Dutch

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

coach and former professional player who played as a

goalkeeper In many team sports that involve scoring goal (sport), 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 i ...

. As a player, he notably spent eight years with

Wimbledon Wimbledon most often refers to: * Wimbledon, London, a district of southwest London * Wimbledon Championships, the oldest tennis tournament in the world and one of the four Grand Slam championships Wimbledon may also refer to: Places London * W ...

where he featured in the

Premier League The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football Lea ...

. He also played in England's top flight for

Nottingham Forest Nottingham Forest Football Club is a professional association football club based in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, England. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football league system, English football. Founde ...

and

Tottenham Hotspur Tottenham Hotspur Football Club, commonly referred to as simply Tottenham (, , , ) or Spurs, is a professional Association football, football club based in Tottenham, North London, England. The club itself has stated that it should always ...

. He had spells in his native the Netherlands with

PSV Eindhoven Philips Sport Vereniging (; ), abbreviated as PSV and internationally known as PSV Eindhoven (), is a Dutch sports club from Eindhoven, Netherlands. It is best known for its professional association football, football department, which has pla ...

and in Scotland with

Dunfermline Athletic Dunfermline Athletic Football Club is a Scottish professional football club based in the city of Dunfermline, Fife. Founded in 1885, the club currently compete in the after winning the 2022–23 Scottish League One title. Dunfermline play at ...

, and in

the Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, it is the oldest football league in the world, and was the top-level football league in England from ...

with

Sheffield United Sheffield United Football Club is a professional football club based in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. The club competes in the Championship, the second tier of English football. They are nicknamed "the Blades" due to Sheffield's history ...

Stoke City Stoke City Football Club is a professional association football club based in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England. The team competes in the , the second level of the English football league system. Founded as Stoke Ramblers in 1863, the cl ...

Wolverhampton Wanderers Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club ( ), commonly referred to as Wolves, is a professional association football, football club based in Wolverhampton, England. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football league s ...

Playing career

Segers was born in

Eindhoven Eindhoven ( ; ) is a city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality of the Netherlands, located in the southern Provinces of the Netherlands, province of North Brabant, of which it is the largest municipality, and is also locat ...

North Brabant North Brabant ( ; ), also unofficially called Brabant, Dutch Brabant or Hollandic Brabant, is a province in the south of the Netherlands. It borders the provinces of South Holland and Gelderland to the north, Limburg to the east, Zeeland to ...

. His early career was with home-town club

, before being signed for

Brian Clough Brian Howard Clough ( ; 21 March 1935 – 20 September 2004) was an English football player and manager, primarily known for his successes as a manager with Derby County and Nottingham Forest. He is one of four managers to have won the Englis ...

during the 1983–84 season. In his first season with Forest he played 32 times but lost his place to Steve Sutton and played in 12 matches in 1985–86. He made 18 appearances in 1986–87 and signed for

on loan in March 1987 playing in one

Second Division In sport, the Second Division, also called Division 2 or Division II is usually the second highest division of a league, and will often have promotion and relegation with divisions above and below. Following the rise of Premier League style compet ...

match for the "Potters", a 4–1 defeat away at

West Bromwich Albion West Bromwich Albion Football Club (), commonly known as West Brom or The Albion, is a professional association football club based in West Bromwich, West Midlands, England. They compete in the EFL Championship, the second level of the Englis ...

. He was used less frequently than Sutton during that season 1987–88, appearing in five matches, while Sutton remained the preferred choice in goal. He spent time that season out on loan at

and Scottish side

. In 1988, Segers joined

as the replacement for

Dave Beasant David John Beasant (; born 20 March 1959) is an English football coach and former goalkeeper. As a player, he was a goalkeeper, who notably played top-flight football for Wimbledon, Newcastle United, Chelsea, Southampton and Nottingham Fo ...

in the aftermath of their FA Cup glory in 1988. His playing style was considered compatible with Wimbledon's tactics at the time, which emphasized long goal kicks, similar to his predecessor Dave Beasant. He would remain the club's first choice goalkeeper over the next eight seasons, making 265 league appearances. Wimbledon did not secure additional major titles during Segers’s tenure, but the club consistently remained in the top flight, never finishing below 14th place, and peaked at sixth place in the

FA Premier League The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football ...

in 1994. In 1994, he was accused of involvement in

match fixing In organized sports, match fixing (also known as game fixing, race fixing, throwing, rigging, hippodroming, or more generally sports fixing) is the act of playing or officiating a contest with the intention of achieving a predetermined result, v ...

, together with

Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...

goalkeeper

Bruce Grobbelaar Bruce David Grobbelaar (born 6 October 1957) is a Zimbabwean former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper, most prominently for English club Liverpool between 1981 and 1994, and for the Zimbabwean national team. Regarded as one of ...

, Wimbledon striker

John Fashanu John Winton Fashanu (born 18 September 1962) is an English television presenter and former professional footballer. As a footballer he was a centre-forward from 1978 until 1995, most notably in an eight-year spell at Wimbledon in which he won ...

and a Malaysian businessman. The case was referred to Winchester Crown Court for a criminal trial in 1997 but all four defendants were cleared. In December 1997, Grobbelaar and Segers were found guilty by

the Football Association The Football Association (the FA) is the Sports governing body, governing body of association football in England and the Crown Dependencies of Jersey, Bailiwick of Guernsey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man. Formed in 1863, it is the oldest footb ...

of breaching betting regulations. In the summer of 1996, Segers signed for

as understudy to

Mike Stowell Michael Stowell (born 19 April 1965) is an English former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper, and is currently the goalkeeping coach at club Maccabi Tel Aviv. As a player, he spent twenty years as a professional, eleven of whic ...

. A brief spell in the

Conference A conference is a meeting, often lasting a few days, which is organized on a particular subject, or to bring together people who have a common interest. Conferences can be used as a form of group decision-making, although discussion, not always d ...

with

Woking Woking ( ) is a town and borough status in the United Kingdom, borough in north-west Surrey, England, around from central London. It appears in Domesday Book as ''Wochinges'', and its name probably derives from that of a Anglo-Saxon settleme ...

followed, before returning to Wolves again. A highlight during his time at Wolves was helping them reach the semi-finals of the

1997–98 FA Cup The 1997–98 FA Cup (known as The FA Cup sponsored by Littlewoods for sponsorship reasons) was the 117th staging of the FA Cup. The competition was won by Arsenal with a 2–0 victory against Newcastle United at Wembley Stadium. Calendar Qual ...

. In the quarter-finals, against

side

Leeds United Leeds United Football Club is a professional football club based in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. The team compete in the Premier League, the top tier of the English football league system. Leeds United have won the League Championship th ...

, Wolves were leading 1-0 before a young

Robbie Keane Robert David Keane (born 8 July 1980) is an Irish professional football coach and former player who played as a striker and is currently the head coach of Ferencváros. Keane served as captain of the Republic of Ireland from March 2006 until h ...

conceded a penalty in the dying minutes. However Segers saved

Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink Jerrel Floyd "Jimmy" Hasselbaink ( ; born 27 March 1972) is a Dutch professional football manager and former player. Born in Suriname, he and his family would later move to the Dutch city of Zaandam where he first played football, initially a ...

's penalty to see his side through. Segers returned to the Premier League with

, where he spent three years (playing just one league game) primarily as a backup goalkeeper until he finally retired in the summer of 2001, a few months before his 40th birthday.

Coaching career

He was goalkeeper-coach at Tottenham Hotspur until 26 October 2007 when he was asked to stand down with immediate effect following the sacking of

Martin Jol Maarten Cornelis "Martin" Jol (born 16 January 1956) is a Dutch football manager and former midfielder. He played over 400 games during his career which included spells in the Netherlands, Germany and England, as well as earning three caps wi ...

. Segers returned to his home-town club,

as a goalkeeping coach in July 2008 until June 2011, when he linked up again with new

Fulham Fulham () is an area of the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham in West London, England, southwest of Charing Cross. It lies in a loop on the north bank of the River Thames, bordering Hammersmith, Kensington and Chelsea, London, Chelsea ...

manager Jol as Fulham's goalkeeping coach. In November 2018 Hans assumed the role of goalkeeper coach with the Australian national team until the completion of the AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019. Segers was goalkeepers coach of

Eerste Divisie The Eerste Divisie (; ) is the second-highest tier of football in the Netherlands. It is linked with the top-level Eredivisie via promotion/relegation systems. It is also known as the Keuken Kampioen Divisie due to sponsorship reasons, while ...

club

FC Eindhoven Football Club Eindhoven, commonly known as FC Eindhoven, is a professional association football, football club based in Eindhoven, Netherlands, that competes in the Eerste Divisie, the second tier of Dutch football league system, Dutch football ...

between 2014 and 2017, and again from 2021.

Career statistics

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Segers, Hans Living people 1961 births Footballers from Eindhoven Dutch men's footballers Men's association football goalkeepers English Football League players Scottish Football League players Premier League players Eredivisie players PSV Eindhoven players Nottingham Forest F.C. players Stoke City F.C. players Sheffield United F.C. players Dunfermline Athletic F.C. players Wimbledon F.C. players Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C. players Woking F.C. players Tottenham Hotspur F.C. players Tottenham Hotspur F.C. non-playing staff Fulham F.C. non-playing staff Dutch expatriate men's footballers Dutch expatriate sportspeople in England Expatriate men's footballers in England Dutch expatriate sportspeople in Scotland Expatriate men's footballers in Scotland Association football controversies Sportspeople involved in betting scandals 20th-century Dutch sportsmen FC Eindhoven non-playing staff