Leo Canjels – the Canon from Breda

The Story

Leo Canjels – a Club Icon

When you score 33 goals in one season and you do 34 the very next year in the highest Dutch Football league? Then you are a great player, a club icon. Nevertheless, after 60 years, almost no one remembers Leo Canjels. Not even in his hometown where he played for @NACbreda. Heroes are soon forgotten especially when you stop acting like one.

The Canon

We seem to reinvent the wheel every generation, at least every 25 years. And every generation has its own fresh idols. But the longer you don’t have a war or the longer tough times are over, the less exciting our new heroes will be. The best heroes come out of times of trouble, and our 1950’s were for sure an era that was built out of post-war misery. For Leo a perfect opportunity to make his mark. The public recognized his talent and appreciated the many goals. He understood he had to take every chance and so he shot from every angle, from every distance. Even long shots make it.

One of the Greatest

Canjels! One of the three greatest football players of Breda before 1985! Perhaps before 1980, as at that time young Ton Lokhoff was already growing to be one of the most heavy strategical talents on the midfield the club ever had (also in weight). Canjels: fast as a bullet, hard as a Canon. In his last season he was more than 100 kilograms; the bullet was too heavy for the canon.

  Shirt: yellow-black print on white old-style cotton-polyester shirt with shoelace v-neck (185 g/m2)