Jan Hisgen was a Dutch

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 lea ...

who played as a forward for RAP at the turn of the century. He played a crucial role in helping the club win the first

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

1899 Events January * January 1 ** Spanish rule formally ends in Cuba with the cession of Spanish sovereignty to the U.S., concluding 400 years of the Spanish Empire in the Americas.''The American Monthly Review of Reviews'' (February 1899), p ...

and the first-ever international club trophy in European football in

1900 As of March 1 ( O.S. February 17), when the Julian calendar acknowledged a leap day and the Gregorian calendar did not, the Julian calendar fell one day further behind, bringing the difference to 13 days until February 28 ( O.S. February 15 ...

, the Coupe Van der Straeten Ponthoz, scoring the winner in both finals.

Club career

Little is known about his life; Hisgen joined the ranks of RAP at some point in the mid to late 1890s, helping the club win the 1897–98 West Division, four points clear of second-place Sparta. In the national championship play-off against the Eastern champions Vitesse, he scored a

hat-trick A hat-trick or hat trick is the achievement of a generally positive feat three times in a match, or another achievement based on the number three. Origin The term first appeared in 1858 in cricket, to describe H. H. Stephenson taking three Wick ...

to help his side to a 4–2 victory, although some reports say that the four goals were all scored by Hisgen. In the following season, Hisgen was a member of the RAP squad that became the first team in the Netherlands to win the double, the 1898–99 Championship and the 1898–99 KNVB Cup; in the latter's final, he scored the only goal of the match in extra-time to seal a 1–0 victory over

HVV Den Haag HVV (Haagse Voetbal Vereniging; Dutch for The Hague Football Club) is an amateur football club in The Hague, Netherlands. It was founded in 1883 as an extension of HCC, (The)'' Hague Cricket Club''. In 1978, on the occasion of the club's cent ...

. In the following year, in 1900, he was part of the RAP side that participated in the

first edition The bibliographical definition of an edition is all copies of a book printed from substantially the same setting of type, including all minor typographical variants. First edition According to the definition of ''edition'' above, a book pr ...

of the Coupe Van der Straeten Ponthoz, which is regarded by many as the first-ever European club trophy. The tournament was held in

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

, and in the

final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final examination or finals, a test given at the end of a course of study or training *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which d ...

on 17 April, Hisgen once again scored the winner for RAP against HVV to seal a 2–1 victory, thus lifting the first international club trophy in European football. In that same year, Hisgen also helped RAP win the ''Coupe Glorieux'' in

Liège Liège ( ; ; ; ; ) is a City status in Belgium, city and Municipalities in Belgium, municipality of Wallonia, and the capital of the Liège Province, province of Liège, Belgium. The city is situated in the valley of the Meuse, in the east o ...

, which involved many leading English clubs.

Later life

On 31 January 1947, Hisgen was visited and interviewed by PJ Linder of the magazine ''Sportief''.

Legacy

As a tribute to the author of the winning goal of the 1899 KNVB Cup, a street in Amsterdam-Noord was named after him, the JH Hisgenpad.

Honours

;AVV RAP * Dutch Championship: **Champions (2):

1898 Events January * January 1 – New York City annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York as the world's second largest. The city is geographically divided into five boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queen ...

: **Champions (1):

* Coupe Van der Straeten Ponthoz: **Champions (1):

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hisgen, Jan Year of birth missing Year of death missing Dutch men's footballers Men's association football forwards