Daryl Janmaat opens up on cocaine addiction and the harm it caused | OneFootball

Daryl Janmaat, 36, has revealed how a cocaine addiction ravaged his life, and says he is now clean.

"I cannot and do not want to go into details, but my cocaine addiction caused me a lot of suffering. I had so many plans, then a knee injury changed everything," he told AD.

The former Newcastle right-back and Netherlands international, who retired in 2022, described the turning point. "That knee was in a terrible state. After an injection, everything went wrong. The joint became infected because of a bad needle. My career was over, I could not handle it."

He later took a technical director role at ADO Den Haag. "Suddenly I lost the structure I had for years as a footballer. It was hard, the addiction crept in. You start lying to the people you love. It is terrible, I hurt a lot of people."

Speaking around the documentary "Les vrais hommes ne pleurent pas", which focuses on mental health in football, Janmaat said his wife Yoshi left him largely because of the addiction. Now seeking new projects, he has opened his own gym and says his story "can happen to anyone".

Source: L'Équipe