Roel Wiersma (; 15 April 1932 – 4 February 1995) 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 most notably played for
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 the
Netherlands national team.
Wiersma was born in
Hilversum
Hilversum () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of North Holland, Netherlands. Located in the heart of the Gooi, it is ...
and played for amateur side Donar until 1954, when he was signed by PSV Eindhoven. He played at the club for ten seasons, making 316 league appearances. Wiersma served as captain for many years; most notably in
1963
Events January
* January 1 – Bogle–Chandler case: Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation scientist Dr. Gilbert Bogle and Mrs. Margaret Chandler are found dead (presumed poisoned), in bushland near the Lane Cove ...
when his team won the
Eredivisie
The Eredivisie (; "Honour Division" or "Premier Division") is a professional association football league in the Netherlands and the highest level of the Dutch football league system. The league was founded in 1956, two years after the start o ...
title. Between 1954 and 1962, he also played 53 caps for the
Netherlands national team. In fifteen of his appearances, Wiersma served as captain of the Dutch squad. After a short period at
EVV, he retired and committed himself to coaching and policy positions.
Early life
Wiersma was born in
Hilversum
Hilversum () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of North Holland, Netherlands. Located in the heart of the Gooi, it is ...
in 1932, after his parents had decided to move there from
Amsterdam
Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...
five years earlier.
Wiersma is a
Frisian name; his paternal grandfather was born in
Harlingen.
At age 8, he joined the sports club Donar in his home town. Besides football, Wiersma played a range of different sports at Donar, including
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...
,
basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...
and
table tennis
Table tennis (also known as ping-pong) is a racket sport derived from tennis but distinguished by its playing surface being atop a stationary table, rather than the Tennis court, court on which players stand. Either individually or in teams of ...
.
Club career
In 1949, Wiersma debuted for the Donar first team, which played in the Dutch Fourth Division at the time. In his first season, the club was immediately promoted to the Third Division. Wiersma played for Donar until the 1954-55 season, when the team again won promotion; this time to the Second Division. His games at Donar were combined with his performances on the
national Air Force football team (as part of his
conscription
Conscription, also known as the draft in the United States and Israel, is the practice in which the compulsory enlistment in a national service, mainly a military service, is enforced by law. Conscription dates back to antiquity and it conti ...
).
For Wiersma’s military service, he was stationed 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 ...
as a sports instructor
sergeant
Sergeant (Sgt) is a Military rank, rank in use by the armed forces of many countries. It is also a police rank in some police services. The alternative spelling, ''serjeant'', is used in The Rifles and in other units that draw their heritage f ...
. He arranged a match for the Air Force team against an English military team. After
Heerenveen’s Imke de Jong was outplayed by his English counterpart, Wiersma decided to substitute De Jong and bring himself onto the field.
During his service, Wiersma trained several times at
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 his performances at Donar and the Air Force football team meant that PSV decided to sign him in 1954.
From the 1950s onwards, PSV conducted a shift in player’s heritage; the team went from mostly
Brabantian
Brabant is a traditional geographical region (or regions) in the Low Countries of Europe. It may refer to:
Place names in Europe
Belgium
* Province of Brabant, which in 1995 was split up into two provinces and an autonomous region:
** Flemish B ...
men to players nationwide. Part of this policy was Wiersma’s transfer, who moved for a fee of 3000
Guilder
Guilder is the English translation of the Dutch and German ''gulden'', originally shortened from Middle High German ''guldin pfenninc'' (" gold penny"). This was the term that became current in the southern and western parts of the Holy Rom ...
s (although PSV eventually only paid 2500 Guilders to Donar).
Every player who signed for PSV, would also work for
Philips
Koninklijke Philips N.V. (), simply branded Philips, is a Dutch multinational health technology company that was founded in Eindhoven in 1891. Since 1997, its world headquarters have been situated in Amsterdam, though the Benelux headquarter ...
, as was customary at the time. His father and siblings already worked for the Nederlandsche Seintoestellen Fabriek (NSF), which was partially owned by Philips. Consequently, Wiersma started to work at the NSF as well.
Throughout his career, Wiersma faced a few problems with PSV: the club promised to financially support his engineering education, but failed to do so until he threatened to move to Feyenoord. And when Wiersma left PSV, he did not receive the conventional 3000 Guilders bonus that every player got.
Still, Wiersma remained at PSV for ten years and was captain of the 1963 squad that won the Eredivisie, his first and only trophy.
He was present at PSV's first match in the
European Cup
The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by top-division European clubs. The competition begins with a round robi ...
in September 1955, when they faced
Rapid Wien
Sportklub Rapid (), commonly known as Rapid Wien or Rapid Vienna in English, is an Austrian professional football club playing in the country's capital city of Vienna. Rapid has won the most Austrian championship titles (32), including the f ...
(and lost 6-2 on aggregate). More successful was PSV's
1963-64 European Cup campaign, when they reached the quarterfinals. Wiersma played in all six matches that season.
After PSV appointed Bram Appel as the new coach, he announced a new focus on younger players and notified Wiersma that he was not needed anymore. Disappointed, Wiersma left for rivals EVV in 1965 on a free transfer.
In total, he played 316 league matches and scored twice for PSV. Wiersma also appeared in 14 cup matches and eight European matches.
His career at EVV was cut short through injury: in a game against Budel, he broke his
tibia
The tibia (; : tibiae or tibias), also known as the shinbone or shankbone, is the larger, stronger, and anterior (frontal) of the two Leg bones, bones in the leg below the knee in vertebrates (the other being the fibula, behind and to the outsi ...
, forcing him to end his career.
International career

While still playing for Donar in the third tier of the
Dutch league system, Wiersma debuted in the
Netherlands national team. On 24 October 1954, he appeared in an exhibition match against
Belgium
Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...
. Since his first cap, Wiersma set a 35-match streak for not missing a single Netherlands match. This series of matches in a row (starting from the player’s first cap) is a Dutch record until this day. In the match that Wiersma missed and thus ended his record, the Netherlands lost to
West Germany
West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republi ...
0-7. He mostly appeared in friendly matches; Wiersma played four
1958 FIFA World Cup qualification
A total of 55 teams entered the 1958 FIFA World Cup qualification rounds, competing for a total of 16 spots in the final tournament. Sweden as the hosts and West Germany, as the defending champions, qualified automatically, leaving 14 spots open ...
matches and three
1962 FIFA World Cup qualification
A total of 56 teams entered the 1962 FIFA World Cup FIFA World Cup qualification, qualification rounds, competing for a total of 16 spots in the final tournament. Chile national football team, Chile, as the hosts, and Brazil national football team, ...
matches.
Wiersma's most notorious qualification match was an away fixture against
Austria
Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...
. The Dutch team lost 3-2 and Wiersma was stretchered off the field: after a hard tackle by
Robert Dienst
Robert Dienst (1 March 1928 – 13 June 2000) was an Austrian football forward. He died in 2000 after a long illness.
Club career
Robert Dienst started his career at Floridsdorfer AC, where he played his first game as a midfielder during World ...
, he landed on the running track and ended up with a bloody face and a concussion.
In 15 of his matches, Wiersma served as captain of the Dutch side.
His national team career ended after a row with coach
Elek Schwartz
Alexandru "Elek" Schwartz (23 October 1908 – 2 October 2000) was a Romanian professional footballer and coach of the Netherlands national team. With S.L. Benfica he won the national Championship and Cup trophies of 1965 and led the club into ...
, who benched Wiersma after a 4-1 loss against
Denmark
Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...
in 1962. Schwartz blamed Wiersma’s bad performance on a disproportionate attention to his engineering study; Wiersma simply condemned his teammates’ mentality. The Denmark match later turned out to be his last for The Netherlands.
Style of play
Wiersma was a right-footed
right wing back
In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring.
Defenders fall into four main categories: centre-backs, full-backs, sweepers ...
.
He was known to be a powerful, physical defender with great stamina.
Wiersma usually played a rough but fair game.
He was lacking in technical abilities, but he was strong in the air.
Wiersma commented about his own game in 1962: “I am a player with very average technical skills. I could only manage so many years at this level because of my combativeness and because apparently, there are no better defenders around.”
Post-career
After his retirement, Wiersma remained involved in sports. He became coach for the PSV
waterpolo
Water polo is a competitive team sport played in water between two teams of seven players each. The game consists of four quarters in which the teams attempt to score goals by throwing the ball into the opposing team's goal. The team with more ...
team and also coached amateur football sides
TOP Oss
TOP Oss (), is a professional association football club based in the town of Oss, North Brabant, Netherlands, that competes in the Eerste Divisie, the second tier of the Dutch football league system. Founded in 1928 as T.O.P., a Dutch abbrevia ...
and ASV ‘33. In the 1976-77 season, he coached another amateur side, VV Oirschot Vooruit. In 1961 he was one of the founders of the Vereniging van Contractspelers (VVCS), a union for professional football players.
Wiersma started out as vice-chairman and between 1967 and 1975 he served as the chairman of the VVCS.
Starting from 1979, Wiersma was also a board member for technical affairs at the
KNVB
The Royal Dutch Football Association (, ; KNVB ) is the governing body of football in the Netherlands. It organises the main Dutch football leagues (Eredivisie and Eerste Divisie), the amateur leagues, the KNVB Cup, and the Dutch men's and women ...
.
After he quit his position as board member, he also served in several commissions at the KNVB. He also worked as analyst for Dutch newspaper
De Telegraaf
''De Telegraaf'' (; ) is the largest Netherlands, Dutch daily morning newspaper. Haro Kraak,Gaat Paul Jansen de crisis bij De Telegraaf oplossen?, ''de Volkskrant'', 2015. Retrieved 1 August 2015. Paul Jansen has been the editor-in-chief since ...
.
On 4 February 1995, Wiersma died of a heart failure during a game of tennis.
Awards and honours
Club
; PSV Eindhoven
*
Eredivisie
The Eredivisie (; "Honour Division" or "Premier Division") is a professional association football league in the Netherlands and the highest level of the Dutch football league system. The league was founded in 1956, two years after the start o ...
(1):
1962-63
Career statistics
International
Notes and references
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wiersma, Roel
1932 births
1995 deaths
Dutch men's footballers
Netherlands men's international footballers
PSV Eindhoven players
Footballers from Hilversum
Men's association football defenders
20th-century Dutch sportsmen