While Peter Houtman’s voice can normally be heard during Feyenoord’s home games, De Kuip was overwhelmed by the enthusiasm of Lars de Klein on Sunday. The 43-year-old Gorcumer was the winner of a competition organized by the club, in which a competition as a stadium speaker could be won.
Under the guise of ‘never shot is always wrong’, Lars was one of the almost 200 entries for the competition at the insistence of his daughter. “The two of us jokingly recorded something and didn’t expect anything from it afterwards,” says De Klein RTV Rijnmond about the enthusiastic audition he recorded in his living room. “Until I got the call this week that I had been chosen. Then you really bounce like a bouncy ball.”
On Sunday he actually stood in the shoes of Peter Houtman, who had to miss the match against FC Utrecht due to a rare weekend away. Despite healthy tension, Lars was mainly looking forward to it. After all, De Kuip holds no secrets for him. “I always sit in section PP with my children. We are all Feyenoord and if you can announce your own players, the enthusiasm will naturally arise.”
Whipping up
As a teacher, Lars knows how to get people involved and this is evident when he lets the line-ups of both teams echo through the stadium. “Fine dattie there is still a Feyenoord player! Jens Toornstra!”, shouts the occasional stadium speaker, after which De Kuip follows: “Jensie is a Feyenoord player”.
The former player of the Rotterdam team is also serenaded after the kick-off, until Othman Boussaid’s 0-1 comes from a corner from Toornstra and the crowd falls silent for a moment. A little later, Utrecht even made it 0-2 via a penalty from Sam Lammers. “I thought, ‘dally I only know the players from Utrecht to call for it’. But you could see as the match progressed that we were getting better. And that it then becomes 4-2, that they turn it around like that, that’s great. Really great. That really tops it off, it would have been a great day with every result, but this really tops it off.”
Mistake
Due to a minor miscommunication, Lars’ debut as a stadium speaker does not go completely smoothly. During Feyenoord’s triple substitution, he initially announced the wrong name. “I realized that Marcos Lopez was coming. Then I was corrected by the audience. And by all the people who were standing on my neck, that it was Ondrej Lingr after all. But in the end it turned out fine. I do know that I was in My own football team can now announce the substitutions. I can already guess my nickname.”
However, due to his energy and compelling lyrics, he is immediately forgiven. “I think and hope that I won on my enthusiasm. If you have the opportunity to do this, I will also throw in the enthusiasm here.”
Unique experience
Afterwards there were a lot of positive reactions about Lars’ performance. Supporters say they would like to see him return again and that Peter Houtman’s successor is already ready with him. Slot also more than approves of the replacement for the former Feyenoord striker. “Funnily enough, I’m always busy creating an atmosphere for the match in the stadium. So I’m still thinking about that tu-tu-tu-tu-du song, that it will still be there for a while. But that was perhaps less necessary today, because after the enthusiasm of the stadium speaker the atmosphere was there anyway.”
Lars himself also wants more, although he remains modest. “Peter is of course an icon of Feyenoord, he always has to do that. But of course he can always call me, because I really thought this was a fantastic experience.”
He will not soon forget this day. “In one word: fantastic! Great, this is an experience that I will take with me for the rest of my life. It is unique that this can happen to me.”
Tags: Hope talking enthusiasm ..
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