Dutch drifter Jos Hooiveld aiming to prove doubters wrong

JOS Hooiveld has every reason to believe good things come to those who wait. As he settles into life in a fifth different country in as many years, Celtic's new Dutch defender is convinced he has finally found the ideal location to prove a point to his homeland.

Once rated as one of the brightest prospects in the Netherlands when he broke into the Heerenveen first team, Hooiveld's career drifted badly off course as a loan move to second-tier Zwolle was followed by his transfer in 2006 to Austrian club Kapfenburg, where he says he reached his lowest point.

After failing to secure a deal at Livingston following a trial period, Hooiveld found salvation in Finland with Inter Turku as he helped them win their domestic title in 2008. He repeated that achievement in Sweden last year where his performances for AIK Stockholm secured him Player of the Year status and attracted the attention of Celtic manager Tony Mowbray.

Hooiveld was formally unveiled as a Celtic player yesterday following his 1.5 million transfer last week and the loquacious 26-year-old is eager to follow his compatriot Glenn Loovens' path into the Dutch national squad.

"If you do well here, then it puts you back in the spotlight as far as your international team is concerned," said Hooiveld. "Glenn has got into the Dutch squad since he joined Celtic and it would be really nice for me to do the same.

"In Holland, they stopped believing in me at a young age. I wasn't mature enough and I found myself in a negative situation. If I do well here, then I can only laugh at the people who doubted me. At one point in my career, when I left Holland to go to Austria, I hit rock bottom. I never had the feeling I wanted to walk away from football, but it was a difficult time. People there were unfair to me. It was incredible what happened to me at that club.

"On one occasion, I got a yellow card in a game and was fined 1,000. Then our captain got two red cards and they gave him a holiday. Maybe they paid for it with my fine. It just went from bad to worse. When I came back after the close season, it had already been in the papers that the club were getting rid of me.

"When I went into the dressing room, the other players asked me why I was there. But I think it has all made me a stronger person, especially mentally, and the last couple of years in Finland and Sweden have been good."

Former Rangers midfielder Bojan Djordjic, who was a team-mate of Hooiveld at AIK, described him this week as "a lunatic". It was an affectionate description of Hooiveld's larger than life character and one that he does not dispute. "Yeah, he's right, I am a lunatic," smiled Hooiveld. "But in a good way. I like to have a laugh in the dressing room, but it is all good things."

A lack of match fitness, with AIK having completed their season in November, is an issue for Hooiveld as he waits to make his Celtic debut.

"The only place I am 100 per cent fit at the moment is in my head," he added. "But I'm working really hard and hope to be able to play very soon."

He is adamant that the demands of playing for one of the Old Firm clubs will not prove an obstacle to his hopes of making the most of the three-and-a-half year contract that he has signed at Celtic.

"It is not pressure to play for Celtic, it is a privilege," he said. "It is a privilege to play for a club that has to win every game, because I also want to win every game. I want to win the championship for a third year with a third different team in a third different country. I don't know if it will put me in the Guinness Book of Records, but it would be nice."