Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink - Atlético Madrid and Chelsea legend

The Dutch forward of Surinamese origin, Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, left his mark amongst Atlético Madrid fans after a short stint at the Spanish club. He arrived in Madrid during the 1999-2000 campaign, which would result in Atlético Madrid dropping down to second division. Nevertheless, many La Liga fans remember his great contributions to the league.

He did not arrive in Spain as a young promise, but as a season 27-year-old player who had played in three European leagues. The Dutch (Stormvogels Telstar and AZ Alkmaar), the Portuguese (Campomaiorense and Boavista) and the English Premier League (Leeds United).

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Atlético Madrid signed the forward for €16.7m (£14.7m, $17.9m) from Leeds United. He scored multiple goals throughout the season, securing the second top scorer in La Liga. He will always be remembered for his remarkable two-goal finish during the 1-3 Madrid derby.

Sadly, with Atlético Madrid on its way to second division, Hasselbaink had to find an alternative club. After a very fruitful season, he packed his bags and left for the Premier League. Where did he go?

During the 2000-2001 season, the Dutch forward returned to the Premier League once again. He signed with Chelsea after securing a €22.50m (£19.24m, $24.2m) transfer deal with Atlético Madrid.

According to Parimatch, the Dutch forward was close to a Chelsea move during the 1999 campaign, but Atlético Madrid secured a deal first. "The previous year, when I was in Leeds, Chelsea showed some interest in me and I wanted to go, but Leeds I didn't want to sell myself to an English club, so I decided to go to Atlético," shared Hasselbaink during an interview.

"I had planned to stay the four years of my contract in Madrid, but when we dropped and Atlético couldn't keep me in the Second Division... So, when Chelsea came looking for me again and made me an offer, I put all my heart into it. The facts proved me right, I made the right decision," he added.

Hasselbaink enjoyed some of his best years as a footballer with the 'Blues'. He played four seasons in which he scored 87 goals, per Transfermarkt. He became the top scorer in the Premier League with 23 goals, above Marcus Stewart, Thierry Henry and Mark Viduka.

Hasselbaink was a natural-born scorer. He made history with the London team after becoming the first player to score a hat-trick coming off the bench. He did so during a match against Wolverhampton in 2004 (5-2).

At the end of the 2003-2004 campaign, Hasselbaink left London to join Middlesbrough for two seasons, where he would enjoy one Europa League final. In 2006, he would sign for Charlton Athletic.

Hasselbaink's departure from Chelsea was not a pretty one... He was caving into the pressures from Roman Abramovich, who wanted him out of the club. The Dutch forward struggled to get any good playing time with Claudio Ranieri and José Mourinho as coach. In an interview on the 'Proper Football' podcast, Chris Kamara and Ben Shephard criticized the Portuguese coach for precisely this.

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"I was absolutely destroyed. More destroyed because Mourinho never spoke to me," said Hasselbaink, who also pointed out that his decision had a lot to do with outside influences: "I bet you that Mourinho had been told that I was a difficult boy. Difficult to deal with. Work and all that kind of stuff, which wasn't the case at all," he said.

The Dutch striker's career would last until September 15, 2008, when, at the age of 36, he decided to announce his retirement as a professional footballer after a final campaign with Cardiff City.

After playing nine seasons in England - at Leeds United, Chelsea, Middlesbrough, and Charlton Athletic - Hasselbaink became the 9th player to score the most goals (127) in the history of the Premier League at the time. Today, he ranks 16th place.

But Hasselbaink was not going to quit football. He hung up his football boots to become a coach and begin a new era of his career.

He began coaching Chelsea's youth ranks, where he would work with the under-16 team. Later on, Nottingham Forest offered Hasselbaink a spot in Nottingham Forest's coaching staff.

Five years after he retired from football, he took charge of Royal Antwerp, a first division team in the Belgian league.

After his first year as coach in Belgium, Hasselbaink went to coach in England, where he spent the rest of his coaching career, passing through Burton Albion (2014-2015), Queens Park Rangers (2015 -2016), Northampton Town (2017-2018) and again Burton Albion, in the 2021-2022 campaign.

In 2016, the Dutchman was involved in the 'Allardyce Scandal', a transfer corruption scheme that hit English football, through a video published by The Telegraph newspaper in which he was seen asking to be part of a business with an agency to sign players for his team (Queen Park Rangers) with which he would pocket a commission of 55,000 pounds.

At the time, he denied "any type of accusation or misconduct" and spoke of an alleged setup by the British newspaper: "One day Mr. McGarvey and Mr. Newell, from The Telegraph, approached me, pretending to be players' agents, and they offered me a sum of money to give a talk in Singapore," he said in a press release.

"I don't see anything strange about being offered money to give a talk. I didn't promise them anything and I didn't ask QPR to sign players who were represented by Messrs. McGarvey and Newell, nor did I make or recommend the signing of footballers for my benefit. staff," he added.

In 2023, he changed his role as head coach and became an assistant in the English team under the guidance of coach Gareth Southgate, his former teammate when he was a player at Middlesbrough.

Amid his work as a coach, we have also seen Hasselbaink regularly in recent years along with other former footballers as a commentator and analyst.

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