Bolo Zenden answers your posers about Ronaldo at PSV, breaking Xavi and dad dancing

At Barcelona, I had a judo challenge with Xavi, but he slipped and dislocated one of his shoulders. He was out for a few weeks

Driving from Eindhoven’s city centre to De Herdgang, PSV’S leafy training ground, you come across the club’s stadium. It’s a pretty route which brings back some good memories for Boudewijn Zenden, who spent many hours of his youth in these climes.

As a kid, ‘ Bolo’ would make the daily commute to Eindhoven by train from his native Maastricht. Now, after a long and illustrious playing career, he takes the same journey again – by car, these days – to inspire PSV’S next generation. Previously a first- team coach, Zenden became assistant manager earlier this campaign after a difficult period for the club led to changes behind the scenes.

FFT arrives to discover the Dutchman guiding players through an afternoon training session, then staying on with a group of forwards for a finishing drill. One of the attackers whose game he helped to refine is now turning heads in the Premier League. Just like Zenden, Steven Bergwijn made a very good first impression in England by scoring on his debut for Tottenham last month.

Zenden himself spent the thick end of a decade in the English top flight, after his big breakthrough at PSV and three years at Barcelona. As he greets us, we dig out your questions...

Was it difficult, trying to break into PSV’S first team in the mid- 1990s?

Joshua Stevenson, Burnley

When I was in the PSV academy, there weren’t too many examples of youth players breaking into the first team. It wasn’t like I didn’t have any confidence in myself; I just wanted to wait and see how far I could get.

When I was 17, I was invited to join the first team for a tournament over in Alicante. On the plane, my manager Aad de Mos was next to me. He said, “How would you feel about starting as a professional next year?” I thought, ‘ Wow!’ Only then did it really occur to me that there was actually a chance of making my breakthrough with PSV.

I had to fight for a place in my debut season, as I didn’t play every game as a newcomer. I commanded a starting spot after a while, and a few years later was Dutch Talent of the Year. I played for the national team at that time, and began to get offers from clubs abroad.

What was it like to play with a young Ronaldo at PSV? He scored 35 goals in 36 matches in your first season.

Sajid Hussain, Ipswich

At that time he was already very quick, highly skilled technically, focused on the goal and always able to hit the net. And besides that, he was just a really good guy off the pitch – we got on so well. We’re from the same generation, both born in 1976, about one month apart. When foreign players joined the club, I always tried to pick up a bit of the language so I could communicate with them. In this case, I went out and bought this little book for beginners in Portuguese – that’s how I got to know Ronaldo early on.

We were both 17 when we got into the PSV first team, the only difference being that he had won the World Cup! I remember that when Dick Advocaat arrived at the club as our new coach in 1994, Ronaldo was waving a keychain around, and it had a small World Cup replica attached to it. Advocaat had been the Netherlands coach when we lost to Brazil in the quarter- finals of the World Cup that year. [ Laughs] Ronaldo liked to joke around.

The two of us were living in the same apartment complex, but while I was renting a one- bedroom flat, he stayed in a penthouse! So, I would usually go to his house for dinner and to watch television. Often, he had an entourage of his family and friends around, which was always good fun.

Why are you known as ‘ Bolo’? It’s Portuguese for ‘ cake’. Are you called Bolo because you really like cake?

Roz Sa, via Facebook

No, although I’d almost say, ‘ I’m sweet like Bolo’. [ Laughs] My brother actually came up with the nickname for me. He really liked skateboarding, and in that scene nicknames were pretty common. If we went on holidays abroad, people had difficulties pronouncing my name, so my brother came up with ‘ Bolo’. It was well received, and once we were back home in Holland, I told everyone at PSV about it. They liked it – especially Ronaldo, who started using it straight away. [ Laughs] From then on the name always remained, and outside Holland, people only know me as ‘ Bolo’ rather than Boudewijn.

Weren’t you a competitive judoka as a kid? Were you any good?

Greg Moore, London

My father was talented in the sport – a knee injury forced him to retire early, but he teamed up with the Dutch world and Olympic champion Anton Geesink to promote a judo programme around the world. He was a judo commentator for Dutch TV too, and opened a sports school at home. As a kid, I only had to