Marked for Lars de Blok
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings26 Apr 2027
No sign of nerves from Bendegúz Kovács at 20 — 8.51
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Bendegúz Kovács did not need any: 8.51, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Match24 Apr 2027
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 7 matches without defeat is a foundation VVV-Venlo did not have in the autumn.
Squad26 Apr 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at VVV-Venlo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match24 Apr 2027
VVV-Venlo keep winning on the road
4 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Words at VVV-Venlo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jordy Bruijn is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The terraces26 Apr 2027
He is 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Match24 Apr 2027
A 2‑0 win over MVV Maastricht, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
The dugout26 Apr 2027
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Cody Strootman, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
The dugout26 Apr 2027
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad22 Mar 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Abdallah Aberkane
46 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. VVV-Venlo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings22 Mar 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.27, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad22 Mar 2027
He is 19, he is averaging 7.50, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Match20 Mar 2027
VVV-Venlo make home a hard place to visit
13 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Squad22 Mar 2027
6 saves, and a scoreline the ten men in front of him had no right to. Goalkeepers only get noticed on the bad days; this was one of the other ones.
The dugout22 Mar 2027
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad22 Mar 2027
At 18 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Match20 Mar 2027
2‑2, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
The dugout22 Mar 2027
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 2‑2 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad24 Aug 2026
Junior Ferreira damages knee ligaments — 18 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 18 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
A brace, and Joey Sleegers takes the afternoon — 8.05
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Joey Sleegers provided it, and the 8.05 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Market24 Aug 2026
Willem II come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and VVV-Venlo did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
$550.0K was the most the club would pay and AZ were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Lasse Wehmeyer and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match22 Aug 2026
Three points for VVV-Venlo, 3‑2 the final word against Jong AZ in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at VVV-Venlo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jordy Bruijn is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The terraces24 Aug 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Naïm Matoug has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad17 Aug 2026
25 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. VVV-Venlo lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad17 Aug 2026
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Bendegúz Kovács, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 7.70
A mark of 7.70 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Squad17 Aug 2026
A move Luciano Slagveer would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Luciano Slagveer is living that version at VVV-Venlo, and it tends to show in the first month.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Ajax have kept their man, and VVV-Venlo go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Market17 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
VVV-Venlo have gone to AZ with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at VVV-Venlo
Lasse Wehmeyer and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match15 Aug 2026
Cambuur left with the points after a 1‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.