Sergio van Dijk will hope to mark his 100th Hyundai A-League appearance by helping Adelaide United to victory over Perth Glory on Thursday.
Sergio van Dijk will hope to mark his 100th Hyundai A-League appearance by helping Adelaide United to victory over Perth Glory on Thursday.
After starting his Australian adventure with Queensland Roar, Van Dijk will make it 50 outings for Adelaide if, as expected, he leads the line for the home team at Hindmarsh Stadium this week.
Van Dijk began his professional career with Groningen in his native Holland, but only managed two first-team appearances for the club as they gained promotion to the Eredivisie in 2001.
He switched to Dutch second-tier club Helmond Sport in 2002, notching 13 league goals in 87 matches.
A move to Eerste Divisie rivals Emmen followed in 2005, where Van Dijk played alongside brother Danny for a single season in 2007/08.
After 32 goals in 98 league outings for Emmen, Van Dijk was introduced to the Australian football public when he signed for Queensland Roar in June 2008.
The striker went on to make 50 Hyundai A-League appearances for the Roar, netting 25 goals.
He also became the first player from the club to score a hat-trick, bagging all the goals during a 3-1 victory over Sydney in January 2009.
Adelaide recruited Van Dijk in February 2010, initially on a six-month contract, with their AFC Champions League campaign in mind.
He debuted at home to then-reigning AFC champions Pohang Steelers at Hindmarsh Stadium later that month, and opened his Adelaide account with a goal away to Shandong Luneng.
Van Dijk helped Adelaide to first place in Group H of the competition, and scored a 95th-minute goal to send their round-of-16 tie against Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors into extra-time.
But he was unable to prevent them going down to a 3-2 loss in extra time at Hindmarsh.
This season Van Dijk is Adelaide’s top scorer with seven goals from 19 appearances.
He also netted once in a 3-0 AFC Champions League playoff win over Indonesian club Persipura, helping to book Adelaide’s place in the group stages of the 2012 tournament.
Van Dijk will need to be at his best if Adelaide are to come out on top when Perth Glory arrive in South Australia this week.
United come into the match on the back of two successive defeats, 2-1 at home to Sydney on February 19, and 1-0 away to Newcastle Jets five days later.
They did record back-to-back wins earlier in February, but those were their only victories from 10 matches in all competitions.
Perth meanwhile while be looking for revenge after they went down 3-0 at home to Brisbane Roar in their last match.
As disappointing as that comprehensive Brisbane defeat was, fourth-placed Perth have only lost two from their last 11 outings, and will be hopeful of getting their finals charge back on track against an Adelaide team that sits second bottom in the standings.
