PSL clubs have a chance to sign Dutch-born South African striker Simon van Duivenbooden who is reported to be in the country looking for a new club.
Van Duivenbooden has spent the whole of his life and career in the Netherlands but has been released by Dutch club Vitesse, where he spent the whole of last season in the second tier in the Netherlands, but is now a free agent after being released.
South African fans will remember Van Duivenbooden after he was named into the Bafana Bafana preliminary squad for the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations before he was dropped when coach Hugo Broos named his final squad ahead of matches against Uganda and Tanzania in September 2024.
Can PSL teams take a chance on Van Duivenbooden?
Since then, nothing has been heard of Van Duivenbooden, who played 16 games for Vitesse in the just-concluded season but did not score a goal.
That is not a record that would endear him to PSL sides but Kaizer Chiefs are in the market for a striker and it is not known if the 23-year-old, who had scored 24 goals in 37 games for the Vitesse U21 team, is a player that would interest them.
Van Duivenbooden was born in Uithoorn, in the province of North Holland, on May 11, 2002 to a South African father and many of his family members live in the country.
That made him eligible to represent both South Africa and the Netherlands but having not turned out for the Dutch yet, he made the decision to represent Bafana Bafana before acquiring his South African passport in June 2024.
Striker has spent whole career in the Netherlands
He honed skills at Legmeervogels and Alphense Boys before joining the Vitesse academy in 2017, playing for two years before he switched to PSV Eindhoven in 2019.
At Vitesse, he made 75 appearances from the U17 level, scoring 45 goals while providing seven assists, before the move to Eindhoven where his career blossomed further.
He returned to Vitesse in 2021 but made just two appearances in 2021-22. He would turn out for the club nine times in 2022-23, scoring one goal, but was a bit-part player in 2023-24 when he made only three appearances across all competitions.
