Nicolas Robert Christian Lombaerts (born 20 March 1985) is a Belgian former professional footballer who played as a centre-back and current assistant manager of K.A.A. Gent.
Lombaerts joined Club Brugge at young age where he went through all youth ranks. He claimed various league titles at young age as he was part of a strong generation at Brugge, with players such as Jason Vandelannoite, Glenn Verbauwhede and Thomas Matton.
As his ambition was to play in the starting lineup of a first division team as soon as possible and Club Brugge was not able to guarantee this, he moved to Gent where he soon was able to play almost every match in the 2005–06 Belgian First Division and also got his first appearance for the Belgium national football team. Apart from football, he was at that point still studying law at Ghent University. Several times he was selected for the Belgian national youth teams such as the Belgium national under-21 football team. Highlights were the 2004 UEFA European Under-19 Football Championship and the 2007 UEFA European Under-21 Football Championship.
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In July 2007, Lombaerts chose a lucrative transfer to the FC Zenit Saint Petersburg in Russia. At that point he quit his studies and chose for a football career. Zenit eventually won its first Russian league title with the 2007 Russian Premier League. At the beginning of 2008, Lombaerts was sidelined for over half a year as the result of a knee injury. He received knee injury in UEFA Cup game against Villarreal CF during the attack that led to the only away goal against the Spanish team. His actions in this game (goal assist by header) later on have been regarded by Zenit fans as one of the most important steps in the subsequent victory in UEFA Cup. In the following games without him, his team won the 2007–08 UEFA Cup and he also missed the 2008 Summer Olympics where Belgium finished fourth.
Lombaerts finally made his return to Zenit on 19 July 2009, coming on in the 71st minute for Aleksei Ionov against Terek Grozny. Even though Zenit were defeated 3-2, Lombaerts described the happiness of taking the pitch again as similar to "a small child's joy when walking into a shop full of sweets."[2] He then quickly became a fixture in defense for caretaker Anatoliy Davydov, helping Zenit win six consecutive matches to get back into the title hunt. On 29 November 2009, Lombaerts scored the game-winning goal against rival Spartak Moscow to put Zenit into the 2010-11 UEFA Champions League as third-place team in Russia.[3]
On 5 July 2010, Lombaerts signed a four-year contract to remain with Zenit.[4]
On 24 March 2017, it was announced that after 10 seasons with Zenit, Lombaerts will return to Belgium for 2017–18 season, signing with K.V. Oostende.[5] He played his last, 289th official game for Zenit on 17 May 2017 in a game against FC Krasnodar and was honoured by the club.[6]
On 30 July 2019 it was announced, that the club wanted to terminate his contract in exchange for a severance payment of 300,000 euros and was sent to the B-team. The club was in financial problems after owner Marc Coucke left the club, why they wanted to part ways with Lombaerts and his heavy wages.[7][8]
He has made his debut in full internationals in May 2006 in a friendly against Saudi Arabia,[9] and played 3 matches in Euro 2008 qualifying.
On 26 May 2014, in a pre-World Cup match against Luxembourg, Lombaerts came on as a substitute in the 77th minute for Jan Vertonghen. As Belgium had already made the 6 permitted substitutions, the match was therefore declared invalid on 4 June.[10]
On 28 May 2021 it was confirmed, that Lombaerts would become the assistant manager of Hein Vanhaezebrouck at his former club K.A.A. Gent from the start of the 2021-22 season.[11]
Zenit St. Petersburg