page_title: Jimmy Nielsen
section_title: Europe
hierarchical_section_title: Jimmy Nielsen / Club career / Europe
caption_attribution_description: Jimmy Nielsen, goalkeeper of Sporting Kansas City, during a match against the Vancouver Whitecaps in April 2011.
context_page_description: Jimmy Nielsen is a Danish-American retired footballer who played as a goalkeeper who most recently served as head coach of Hartford Athletic in the USL Championship.
  Until June 2007, he played 398 games for Danish team AaB Fodbold. Playing every league match for AaB since 1997, Nielsen won the 1999 Danish Superliga championship with AaB. Nielsen has on occasion featured in the Danish national team setup as an unused substitute. He won the 1998 and 2004 Danish Goalkeeper of the Year award.
context_section_description: Nielsen began his career with Norwich City at the age of 12. He was discovered after Norwich City's youth team traveled to Aalborg to take part in a local youth tournament but their only goalkeeper, Ash Harrison, fell ill and Nielsen was recruited as a replacement. He played for Norwich City until the age of 15 when he was offered professional terms but his mother refused permission for him to move permanently to England. Following this he was signed by local amateur club B 52/Aalborg FC. He played youth football for AaB Fodbold, before signing for English club Millwall F.C. in 1994. He did not play for the club and moved back to Denmark, settling in at AaB in 1995. He made his senior debut in 1996, quickly becoming the starting goalkeeper in AaB. Nielsen was one of the cornerstones of AaB, culminating in the 1998–99 Danish Superliga championship.
  Nielsen signed a contract with Leicester City on 4 June 2007. He joined via Martin Allen's agent, who claimed he was "another Peter Schmeichel". However, he was left in the reserve squad following the arrival of Hungarian goalkeeper Márton Fülöp. As a result, Nielsen revealed he planned to leave the club during the January transfer window, and was given the green light to do so on 14 November. He left the club on 22 January 2008 having his contract terminated by mutual consent without ever having played for the club. The next day he signed a 2½-year contract with Danish team Vejle Boldklub. After the 2009 season, Nielsen was "very close" to retiring Vejle Boldklub, was relegated from the Danish Superliga.
caption: Jimmy Nielsen, goalkeeper of Sporting Kansas City, during a match against the Vancouver Whitecaps in April 2011.
exif: {"Image Make": "Panasonic", "Image Model": "DMC-ZS7", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "180", "Image YResolution": "180", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop Elements 9.0 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2011:04:03 09:33:45", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 50, 53, 48, 0, 0, 14, 0, 1, 0, 22, 0, ... ]", "Image Tag 0xC6D2": "[0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, ... ]", "Image Tag 0xC6D3": "[0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, ... ]", "Image ExifOffset": "664", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1290", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "5210", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/125", "EXIF FNumber": "63/10", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Aperture Priority", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "80", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2011:04:02 16:53:42", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2011:04:02 16:53:42", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "-33/100", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "86/25", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "246/5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "4000", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3000", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "1164", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0/0", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "300", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal"}