Simply Fútbol: Makaay announces retirement

Makaay announces retirement

Posted by Juan Arango 4.26.2010

Former Dutch international Roy Makaay (Wikimedia)

One of the greatest and most prolific goalscorers of the past 20 years announced his retirement from the game. Roy Makaay, 35, plans to hang up his boots and begin to coach within the Feyenoord youth system as he expressed in a press conference on Monday.

Makaay was a symbol of consistency when having to score and was among the most skillful in terms of defining in front of goal.

During his 17-year career he scored a total of 253 goals in the five teams he played in. Still with those numbers, he was overshadowed during the apex of his career by players like Dennis Bergkamp, Patrick Kluivert, and Ruud Van Nistlerooy but was still considered as one of the top scoring threats in the game during the late 90's and early 2000's. Because of these titanic figures in Dutch football, Makaay had a very limited role with the Oranje taking part in the 2004 and 2008 European Championships and was one of the veteran players that was part of the Dutch side that played in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

Roy started his career with Dutch side Vitesse where he started to make a name for himself as a top-notch poacher. That talent was quickly seen and he was signed by Spanish side Tenerife. Makaay was thought to be the individual that would help Los Chicharreros get to the next level, but things did not work out as the team would begin a gradual descent that would see them playing in the Spanish second division in 1999.

He would then sign with Deportivo and his career would take off. With the addition of Makaay and players like Diego Valerón, Djalminha, Diego Tristán, Donato, Songo'o, Mauro Silva, Joan Capdevila, and Jorge Andrade... Euro Depor would go on one of the most impressive runs in team history.

During this time they would win the lone league title in club history as well as two Spanish Super Cups and a Copa del Rey. Makaay was the primary ingredient offensively for Los Blanquiazules as he was league Pichichi in 2002-03 and won the European Golden Boot that same year.

In 2003, he arrived to Bayern Munich on an €18.75 million transfer. There his scoring touch continued to flourish and the trophies continued to come in.   His scoring pace at Bayern (78 goals in 128 matches) was pretty much the same as at La Coruña (79 goals in 133 matches). Percentage wise he improved at Bayern scoring percentage as he surpassed 0.6 goals per match (compared to 0.593 with Depor).

During his time with the Bavarian giants, he won two Bundesliga titles, a German Cup, and a German Super Cup. The writing seemed to be on the wall for the Dutch international as the signings of Luca Toni and Miroslav Klose. That is when he decided to head back home and play for Feyenoord.

At Feyenoord he continued his pace scoring 45 goals in 94 matches.   He will finish out the season before moving over to his coaching role with the club, but before that he will have to revert a 0-2 deficit against Ajax in the final of the Dutch Cup.