FC Groningen

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FC Groningen

Full name

Football Club Groningen

Nickname(s)

Trots van het Noorden
(Pride of the North), The FC

Founded

June 16, 1971

Ground

Euroborg,
Groningen

Capacity

20,000

Chairman

Ed Zijp

Manager

Ron Jans

League

Eredivisie

2005-06

Eredivisie, 5th





Home colours





Away colours

FC Groningen is a football club from Groningen in the Netherlands.

The club was founded in June 16, 1971 by the Groningen Football and Athletics Association (GVAV, founded January 26, 1921). They enjoyed top flight football for most of their existence, although the club was relegated to the second division after the third season.

The club was then propelled back into success by the Koeman brothers, Ronald Koeman and his elder brother Erwin Koeman together with defending midfielder Jan van Dijk resulting in qualification to European football for the first time in the 1982/83 season. Their best season in the Eredivisie was during the 1990/91 season when they finished third.

FC Groningen's home colors are green and white. The club plays its home games in the 20,000 seat Euroborg stadium. In December 2005, the club played its last match ever in the 12,500 seat Oosterpark Stadion after having played there for 72 years. The average attendance in 2004/05 was 12,500 people. This has risen to just below 20,000 people in the new stadium.

The 2005/06 season turned out to be one of the best in a long time for FC Groningen, with the club finishing 5th place in the league. This allowed Groningen to enter the play-off tournament for the UEFA Champions League third round qualification. However, they were beaten by Ajax in the finals who scored a goal two minutes before the final whistle.

By finishing fifth in the league, FC Groningen qualified for European football for the first time in 14 years, where they were defeated 4-3 on aggregate in the first round by Partizan Belgrade.

FC Groningen Ranking Graph 1976-2005

1 Current squad 2006/2007
2 Famous players
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] Current squad 2006/2007

No.	Position	Player
1	GK	Bas Roorda
2	DF	Bruno Silva
3	DF	Gibril Sankoh
4	DF	Arnold Kruiswijk
5	DF	Mathias Florén
6	MF	Paul Matthijs
7	MF	Goran Lovre
8	MF	Yevgeny Levchenko
9	FW	Glen Salmon
10	FW	Erik Nevland
11	FW	Yuri Cornelisse

No.	Position	Player
12	DF	Ondrej Svejdik
13	FW	Koen van de Laak
14	MF	Danny Holla
15	MF	Stefano Seedorf
16	GK	Brian van Loo
17	DF	Antoine van der Linden
20	FW	Luis Suárez
21	MF	Rasmus Lindgren
22	MF	Mark-Jan Fledderus
32	DF	Tom Hiariej
--	FW	Robbin Kieft