Dirk Heinen

Dirk Heinen
Heinen celebrating the Bundesliga championship in 2007
Personal information
Date of birth (1970-12-03) 3 December 1970 (age 54)
Place of birth Cologne, West Germany
Height 1.88 m (6 ft 2 in)
Position(s) Goalkeeper
Team information
Current team
Waterford (Goalkeeper coach)
Youth career
0000–1981 Rot-Weiß Köln-Zollstock
1981–1990 Bayer Leverkusen
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1990–1999 Bayer Leverkusen 107 (0)
2000–2002 Eintracht Frankfurt 62 (0)
2002–2003 Denizlispor 28 (0)
2003–2007 VfB Stuttgart 3 (0)
2008 Arminia Bielefeld 1 (0)
Total 201 (0)
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Dirk Heinen (born 3 December 1970) is a German former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. He works as goalkeeping coach of League of Ireland side Waterford.

Career

Heinen played most of his matches in his nine-year stint at Bundesliga side Bayer Leverkusen, before moving to Eintracht Frankfurt. In 2002, he transferred to Süper Lig side Denizlispor, but returned to the Bundesliga after just one season there, this time joining VfB Stuttgart. There, Heinen was the substitute keeper for Timo Hildebrand. He only played three matches there, his last coming in March 2006. After injury he was demoted to third goalkeeper behind Hildebrand and Michael Langer the following season. A German champion with Stuttgart in 2007, he announced his retirement in July 2007, subsequently emigrating to the native country of his wife Sandra, Ireland (County Waterford).

However, in January 2008 the goalkeeper was re-called to German football, moving to Arminia Bielefeld, who asked him to join them as they were short of goalkeepers in early 2008 due to injuries. On 15 March 2008, the 37-year-old made his comeback in the Bundesliga against Hannover 96 after Arminia's second keeper Rowen Fernandez was injured as well.

He retired at the end of the 2007–08 season for good. Since 2008, he is a successful goalkeeper coach in the FAI Regional Center Waterford and in 2017 Heinen was appointed as goalkeeping coach of local League of Ireland club Waterford.[1] He achieved his goalkeeper and trainer license in Germany.

Honours

VfB Stuttgart

Bayer Leverkusen

References

  1. ^ "Dirk Heinen in Football Manager 2017". sortitoutsi.net. Retrieved 9 April 2017.