Hans Kraay Jr. has in his column: Football International explained how Quinten Timber approached him after the lost match against Sparta Rotterdam (3-4). The ESPN analyst is amazed that the Feyenoord player came to ask him for an interview.
After the final whistle, the midfielder turned to the camera to express his dissatisfaction with Robin van Persie. The trainer had passed him prior to the match and publicly referred to his poor performance in training and in matches. Timber called that ‘nonsense’, a ‘charade’ and indicated that a departure this winter is likely.
“I have to be honest: I did not expect him at all. We had not requested him with ESPN either. We had already had three Feyenoord players and Robin van Persie in front of the camera,” says Kraay. “And just as we were about to close, Quinten Timber suddenly stood next to me in his casual clothes. To everyone’s amazement.” Kraay asked Timber what he came to do. “I need to talk to you, Hanshe said. And then he went wild. I asked if he wanted to do that in private, but no: He wanted to speak to me on camera.”
“From the first second, Quinten Timber was high in emotion,” Kraay describes. “He had read what Robin van Persie had said about him before the match against Sparta, after we asked why Hwang and not Timber was in the starting line-up. Van Persie then replied calmly and said that the intensity and the execution of the tasks were the deciding factor in choosing Hwang.”
According to Kraay, Timber wanted to correct one thing in particular: the image that he wanted to leave Feyenoord on a free transfer. “He wanted to make it emphatically clear that there is absolutely no truth in the rumors that he wanted to leave Feyenoord on a transfer-free basis with zero money at the end of the season. But that it was precisely Feyenoord, his Feyenoord, where he had a fantastic time for years, that Feyenoord, that had to make money from him in this transfer period.”
The day after the interview, it emerged that Olympique Marseille is specifically interested in the Feyenoord midfielder. Timber will travel to France on Wednesday to complete the transfer, it sounds.
