User:Bring back Daz Sampson/Professionalism in Dutch football

<!--From the foundation of the Dutch national football championship in 1898 until 1954, the title was decided through play-offs by a handful of clubs who had previously won their regional league. The competition was purely an amateur one; the Royal Dutch Football Association (KNVB) rejected any form of payment and suspended players who were caught receiving salary or transfer fees. The call for professional football grew in the early fifties after many national team members left to play abroad in search for financial benefits. The KNVB would usually suspend these players, preventing them from appearing for the Dutch national team. After the North Sea flood of 1953, the Dutch players abroad (mainly playing in the French league) organised a charity match against the French national team in Paris. The match was boycotted by the KNVB, but after the assembled Dutch players defeated the French (2–1), the Dutch public witnessed the heights that could be achieved through professional football. To serve the growing interest, a dissident professional football association (the NBVB) and league were founded for the 1954–55 season. On 3 July 1954, the KNVB met with a group of concerned amateur club chairmen, who feared the best players would join the professional teams. The meeting, dubbed the slaapkamerconferentie ('bedroom conference'), led to the Association reluctantly accepting semi-professionalism.

Meanwhile, both the KNVB and the NBVB started their separate competition. The first professional football match was contested between Alkmaar and Venlo. The leagues went on for eleven rounds, before a merger was negotiated between the two federations in November. Both leagues were cancelled and a new, combined competition emerged immediately. De Graafschap, Amsterdam, Alkmaar and Fortuna '54 from the NBVB were accepted to the new league. Other clubs merged, which led to new names like Rapid J.C., Holland Sport and Roda Sport. The first (semi-)professional league was won by Willem II. For the 1956–57 season, the KNVB abandoned the regional league system. The Eredivisie was founded, in which the eighteen best clubs nationwide directly played for the league title without play-offs. The inaugural members of the Eredivisie in 1956 were Ajax, BVC, BVV, DOS, EVV, Elinkwijk, SC Enschede, Feijenoord, Fortuna '54, GVAV, MVV, NAC, NOAD, PSV, Rapid J.C., Sparta, VVV '03 and Willem II. Ajax was the first team to claim the title that season. -->

Throughout the early years of the Eredivisie, the players remained part-time footballers with day jobs. In 1962 the Dutch Ministry of Labour still refused to licence professional footballers unless they had a job outside football. In the 1965–66 Eredivisie, clubs were permitted to sign four full-time professionals each.

The Netherlands national football team which drew 1–1 with England on 9 December 1964 were all part-time professionals, according to their coach Denis Neville.

In 1965 Piet Keizer signed a new contract as AFC Ajax's first ever full-time professional, closely followed by 18-year-old Johan Cruyff. The rest of the Ajax players were part-timers.

The Go Ahead Deventer team who lost 7–0 on aggregate to Celtic in the 1965–66 European Cup Winners' Cup were part-timers.

According to Bill Murray in The World's Game: A History of Soccer (1998), "the Netherlands took up part-time professionalism in 1954 and full professionalism in 1967".

The Feyenoord team which won the 1970 European Cup Final was predominantly full-time, with just two part-timers in the line-up: Piet Romeijn and Guus Haak.

In 1978–79 there were 136 full-time professionals and 295 semi-professionals in the Eredivisie. In 1979–80 there were 132 full-timers and 283 semi-pros. In the Eerste Divisie there were only six full-time professionals in 1978–79 and four in 1979–80 (SC Amersfoort numbers not included).

Dick Advocaat was a part-time footballer who worked for KLM and then a fruit import and export company: "You dreamed about professional football, but at that time almost every player was semi-professional. You also just had to work." Hennie Ardesch (nl) played in the Eredivisie from 1964 to 1977 and remained semi-professional: "Although always semi-professional, Ardesch, who started playing football with Phenix in youth and later switched to the juniors of SC Enschede, remained permanently at the top of national professional football in the sixties and seventies." Atlético Madrid wanted him to turn full-time in 1971 but were frustrated by red tape.

Bud Brocken played for the Netherlands national football team five times in 1983. He was a semi-professional footballer for almost his entire career. In 1985 his manager at FC Groningen Han Berger wanted to transition the club to full-time training but was unable to agree revised terms with Brocken, who left to stay part-time at Willem II.

When Aberdeen signed Peter van de Ven in August 1990, The Press and Journal (Scotland) reported that his former club Willem II (football club) of the Eredivisie was: "one of Holland's small and basically part-time teams".

MVV Maastricht general manager Marcel Franssen in 2003: "In the early nineties MVV finished seventh in the Eredivisie, while half of the players were semi-pro."

In August 1994 NRC Handelsblad published a profile of Martin Koorn (nl), who commuted from his home and employment on Texel to play for clubs in the top two divisions of Dutch football: "Koorn is semi-pro. One of hundreds in professional football. Footballers who once dreamed of Ajax or Feyenoord, but did not reach higher than Heracles or Haarlem."

Johan de Kock played for the Netherlands in UEFA Euro 1996 as a part-time footballer, as he was employed as a civil engineer: "I know it is rare for an international footballer to have another job as well. I can think of only perhaps only one other in the past, but it is not a problem to me."

In 1995–96 FC Groningen striker Mariano Bombarda scored 19 Eredivisie goals as a semi-professional player. FC Groningen captain Harris Huizingh was also semi-professional and worked for the police. Jan Vreman was also a semi-professional player throughout his football career, being employed in the egg trade.

In the 2003–04 Eredivisie, FC Volendam was the only club to field a number of semi-professionals in the first team. Jack Tuijp was one of those players. He played under a youth contract and was simultaneously a student of business economics at the Hogeschool voor Economische Studies (Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences).

Eerste Divisie
In the early–mid 90s FC Emmen consistently challenged for promotion from the Eerste Divisie with a semi-professional team: Frank Veldwijk (nl) was employed in a slaughterhouse. Marco de Haan worked for a company who supplied raw materials to bakeries, and then for Wever transport. Etienne Barmentloo (nl) worked in a tool factory. Alfons Arts (nl) was a PhD student.

By 2000, 90% of Eerste Divisie players were full-time professionals. In 2002, amidst a contraction in wages due to the early 2000s recession, the Association of Contract Players (VVCS) reacted to an increase in part-time players by proposing a minimum semi-professional wage of €25,000. The 2003–04 Eerste Divisie season saw a drop in salaries, a reduction in squad sizes and a substantial increase in the number of semi-professional players.

Albert van der Sleen (nl) owned a toy store while competing for Eerste Divisie club FC Eindhoven as a semi-professional goalkeeper from 1983 to 2000. In January 2003 after transferring to NEC Nijmegen he supported the second tier's move away from full-time training: "It is fine that the Eerste Divisie is going back to a form of semi-professionalism".

Fortuna Sittard offered five of their six out-of-contract players reduced semi-professional terms: Geert Brusselers, Rein Baart, Tycho Steegs, Dario Cagnazzo and Georges Tychon. They also planned to offer amateur first team contracts to additional players, mainly from their own youth system.

BV Veendam narrowly avoided bankruptcy then encouranged its players to turn semi-professional, offering assistance to set up their own business.

In 2010 the Eerste Divisie contemplated another move towards semi-professional football. The league already had around 100 amateur players, and according to the VVCS, many contracted players' wages had fallen to between €1300 and €1400 gross: "If that should become even less, clubs should ask themselves whether they are still in place in professional football".

Sjors Verdellen joined MVV on a semi-professional basis in August 2010. MVV ran a "social support" scheme which helped its semi-professional players find work: "The club has access to a professional coaching team and sponsors who are willing to participate in this. Incidentally, current contact players can also make use of this option. MVV Maastricht is working with a number of players." The Maastricht club had been rescued by the local authority, who agreed a leaseback of the stadium and instituted a maximum wage for a smaller, mainly semi-professional, squad. BV

In March 2011 several other Eerste Divisie clubs were "embracing semi-professionalism due to financial need".

The 2012–13 Eerste Divisie saw two clubs expelled due to bankruptcy. Willem Vissers wrote in de Volkskrant: "In the Eerste Divisie, high salaries for football players are already a thing of the past. Quite a number of clubs operate with a budget of around 2 million euros and have converted to semi-professionalism."

In September 2012 around a third of the 950 professional players in the top two divisions earned under the €25,000 salary necessary to claim the Stichting Contractspelersfonds (CFK) benefit when their playing career ended. Increasing numbers of Eerste Divisie players earned the minimum wage, while over 10% of players were on amateur terms. Some amateurs claimed unemployment benefits while their unscrupulous clubs made false promises of a forthcoming professional contract.

Topklasse club Rijnsburgse Boys beat Eerste Divisie part-timers FC Volendam 1–0 in the second round of the 2012–13 KNVB Cup: "The top-class amateurs beat the semi-pro from the Jupiler League 1–0. The goal came after an hour in the name of Remon van Bochoven."

In the 2016–17 Eerste Divisie, TOP Oss finished 15th of 20 clubs with a largely semi-professional squad. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic in the Netherlands clubs in the 2020–21 Eerste Divisie were only required to have a reduced number of 14 players on contract. TOP Oss remained semi-professional and also had a contingent of first team squad members earning a "volunteer's allowance" of around €1,750 per annum. Use of these amateur players was widespread at other clubs in the league.