Joep Willems

Striker - NEC
15 Sep 2026
Tuesday
Process
Overview Personal Contract News 2 Transfers Relations Events 18 Awards Matches History

Marked for Joep Willems

6 Edition

The NEC Chronicle

7 Sep 2026
From our football correspondent Steady

Market7 Sep 2026

Joep Willems agrees terms with Borneo

The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around NEC people have started saying his name in the past tense.

Transfer targets7 Sep 2026

The window shuts on the Siebe Horemans deal

NEC ran out of time with Utrecht. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.

Player ratings7 Sep 2026

Vintage Virgil Misidjan — 8.24

At 33 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.24, and nobody on the pitch better.

Transfer targets7 Sep 2026

Door shut on Maas Willemsen

NEC asked and Heerenveen said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.

Boardroom7 Sep 2026

Deadline passes with 6 signed and 7 gone

That is the business done at NEC until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.

Market7 Sep 2026

NEC say no — this time

The offer from PSBS Biak for Jim Croqué was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.

Squad7 Sep 2026

Romano Postema falls out with a teammate over standards

The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.

Squad7 Sep 2026

Words exchanged at NEC

Youssef El Kachati 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.

Match5 Sep 2026

Willem II snatch it back from NEC

A goal on 85 minutes turned three points into one and a good afternoon into an argument about game management that will run until Saturday.

In brief

Back issues
5 Edition

The NEC Chronicle

31 Aug 2026
From our football correspondent Crisis

Match29 Aug 2026

Nowhere to hide for NEC

1‑7 against Ajax, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.

Squad31 Aug 2026

A knee injury of the worst kind for Leshano Simons

20 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. NEC lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.

Transfer targets31 Aug 2026

Groningen tell NEC: Thom van Bergen is not for sale

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.

Player ratings31 Aug 2026

Darko Nejašmić goes up and wins it — 7.98

A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.98 for the rest of it.

Market31 Aug 2026

Excelsior come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and NEC did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Player ratings31 Aug 2026

Virgil Misidjan beats them one at a time

Successful dribbles: 24. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.

Match29 Aug 2026

Nobody could stop scoring

8 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about NEC and Ajax in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.

Squad31 Aug 2026

7 past Jasper Cillessen

Whether it was the goalkeeper or the ten in front of him is the argument that will fill every conversation in town this week. 4 saves does not settle it either way.

Market31 Aug 2026

Borneo watching Joep Willems

The interest is real enough to have reached print. NEC have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.

In brief

  • Squad A falling-out at NEC
  • The dugout No hiding place for Dennis Geiger
  • Boardroom Inquest at NEC