Wieke Kaptein

Wieke Hendrikje Maria Kaptein (born 29 August 2005) is a Dutch professional footballer who plays as a midfielder for Women's Super League club Chelsea and the Netherlands national team.

Club career
Kaptein started playing football at Achilles '12. Already at the age of 15, she received a professional contract with FC Twente Enschede. Capping off her first season with the league title, she also featured in 2021/22 UEFA Women's Champions League qualifying, scoring the goal in the opening game against FC Nike Tbilisi to make it 9–0. Twente, however, lost out to Benfica in the Champions Path final. A year later, Benfica was the last stop on the way to the group stage.

In March 2023, Kaptein was voted one of the nine best talents in the world.

International career
Kaptein played some games for the Dutch junior teams from the U-15. With the U-17 team, she took part in the first and second qualifying rounds of the 2022 U-17 European Championship, which was successfully completed in April 2022, where she was captain in the second round. However, she was not part of the squad for the finals in May 2022, because she was wanted for the end of the league season. With the U-19 team, she qualified in October 2022 for the second qualifying round for the 2023 U-19 European Championship. She was not used in the second round in April 2023, as she was nominated for the senior national team games that took place at the same time.

On 11 April 2023, she had her first senior cap. She came on as a substitute in the 81st minute for Lieke Martens in a friendly they won 4–1 against Poland.

On 30 June 2023, she was nominated for the World Cup finals. She was the youngest World Cup debutant ever for the Dutch national team.

Honours
Twente
 * Eredivisie: 2021–22, 2023–24
 * KNVB Women's Cup: 2022–23
 * Eredivisie Cup: 2021–22, 2022–23, 2023–24
 * Dutch Women's Super Cup: 2022, 2023