Hooiveld: Southampton play over the ground and between the lines
The colourful Dutchman has quickly become a fixture in Nigel Atkins promotion chasing side and even scored in the midweek Carling Cup win over Preston North End.
Hooiveld won a championship medal on loan to FC Copenhagen earlier this year and believes that his new side are built along similar lines.
Atkins made ten changes from the team that beat Birmingham on Sunday- only Hooiveld kept his place- with the loan Celt convinced that Southampton are heading in the right direction.
“We’ve got an amazing squad after making ten changes,” the defender told the Southampton website. “And you can see from the way that we play football, sometimes it’s brilliant, it reminds me of playing in European football over the ground and between the lines.
“It’s down to the coach and how he wants to play, we train a lot on that and you can see that it’s coming out. I think we have got a similar way of playing as Copenhagen last year, and they went into the final 16 of the Champions League. I don’t think there’s a big gap between us and Copenhagen.
“It’s amazing the bunch of guys that we have and the players all get along, after the game we go for a meal together, we have a laugh, there’s so much banter before and after training so something is growing here, you can feel that and it’s great to be a part of it all.
“It’s great to come into a happy place as it just gives you that little bit of extra confidence you need. I’ve been welcomed really well. All of the players came to me and talked to me, asked questions that kind of stuff, and were interested in the new guy which makes you feel at home and I need that to be in the middle of the group. I enjoy it very much.”
Hooiveld’s loan deal is only until January with the defender ruling nothing out about his future.
He added: “As a footballer you never know where you wake up the next day as Celtic might want to get me back or maybe here I’m wanted and Celtic don’t want me, or maybe Saints don’t want me and I have to go somewhere else again!
“Football is a strange game, it can go in any direction and that’s the nice part of it. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I just want to be here at this moment and absorb as much of this as I can and get myself to my top level.”
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