Willem van Hanegem’s last stint: sacked by club owner

Willem van Hanegem, emotional….

Right after the jolly Xmas breakfast, the FC Utrecht players are told that Willem van Hanegem, their coach, is sacked.

It’s right before the last trainining session and the players are gobsmacked. Bamboozled. Flabbergasted. They don’t agree. But when Willem wanted to quit his job at Sparta, the players revolted and urged him to stay. This time around, the players realize that the new club owner, Van Seumeren, won’t budge. And they accept the decision. But they decide not to commence training.

General manager Van Dop: “I understand. The message hit home. They weren’t focused anymore, so I let it slide.”

In a corner of the players’ home, Van Dop elaborates: “I wasn’t happy with this decision either, but too much has happened. We feel there’s not longer a basis of trust to work together. He said things (in his column) about our owner that he shouldn’t have.”

Van Hanegem told the club management a week earlier that he wouldn’t extend his contract beyond this season. This coming summer, he would stop as Utrecht coach.

Willem: “I felt it was only fair to tell them this now. There were a couple of benchwarmers for instance who wanted to leave the club. Good lads, but not right for my football vision. So I told them, don’t do anything hasty, because next season there will be another coach here. I think that’s the way you need to work with players, right?”

The whole story started earlier on in the season. Four assistant coaches are told to leave. The club is unhappy with their attitude and Willem van Hanegem, their boss, reluctantly agrees that he also finds it hard to work with them. Former Utrecht, Ajax and Feyenoord striker John van Loen is one of the assistants. “They were arrogant, lazy and they gossiped about others at the club. They weren’t good for our culture and Willem recognized that. But he was too soft – or to humane – to deal with it. The club took the decision to sack them and Willem agreed.”

But, the club went too far. One of the assistants went to court and FC Utrecht’s lawyers wrote a statement for Van Hanegem to sign, as statement for the court. De Kromme refused to sign it. “It wasn’t truthful. The club wanted to create this picture that wasn’t 100% true. I couldn’t play those games and I told them,” Van Hanegem would later say.

In those days, to keep Van Hanegem at FC Utrecht, owner Van Seumeren buttered the former Oranje star up and promised him a longer contract at the club. Willem wasn’t convinced but told him that as long as he enjoyed himself, he would stay. When the whole humbug with the court case was over however, the promises about new contracts reeled in…

In his column, Willem writes: “I immediately felt abandoned and fooled by Van Seumeren. It felt as if he wanted to get rid of me as well. I remember Van Dop mentioning that he wanted to cancel the sacking of the assistants… He had second thoughts, thought it was too harsh… A couple of days later, Van Seumeren plays the power card. I don’t think I can work with that submarine…”

Van Seumeren, who acquired a majority of the Utrecht shares recently, used this column to sack Van Hanegem on the spot. Technical director Piet Buter called in sick, he can’t live with the decision to send De Kromme home. Head coach gone, four assistants gone… It’s going to be a silent christmas in Utrecht.

Van Hanegem and Van Dop have said their goodbyes. “Civilized of course. We shook hands. We made a deal to treat one another civilized in the media. I know I can count on Willem.”