Celine Van Gestel with the national team. — © BELGA
Celine Van Gestel, captain of the Yellow Tigers, retires from volleyball at the age of 26. For her this means the start of a new life, for the national team this means yet another loss. “I want to know how I like life without volleyball.”
Marc Vermeiren, Quinten Torfs
Yesterday at 6:24 PM
A farewell to top sport will rarely be more surprising. Van Gestel has been one of the country’s better volleyball players for half a dozen years, as evidenced by a long career with the national team and in foreign clubs. And then pull the plug at the age of barely 26? “I understand that this decision will be surprising to the outside world and to people who don’t know me, but it is certainly not surprising to my intimates. They know that I have been thinking about this step for years. All the while it was lurking in my head: ‘Is this really what I want?’ So I have thought about it carefully and discussed it in detail with those close to me or with teammates, who have since become friends. Some understood it, others had a more difficult time. National coach Kris Vansnick gave me time to think about it.”
Salary
Is this farewell also a longer-term decision? Wages in women’s volleyball are not high enough for a carefree conversion. “That certainly wasn’t the deciding factor. In foreign clubs you can build up a more than decent salary.”
It turns out that the social burden in particular began to weigh on her. Van Gestel played volleyball abroad at Stuttgart and Aachen in Germany and at Firenze in Italy. “I was always away from home, I always had to say no to social events. People often think that you experience fantastic adventures abroad – and often it is wonderful – but they don’t see that you are alone in your apartment from six o’clock in the evening, where you have to eat alone and watch TV alone. You may have your friends within the team, but that is not quite the same as what you have at home. I found that increasingly difficult. My friend played volleyball himself and had his job here in Belgium. He could come over for a weekend, but I couldn’t ask him to completely turn his life upside down.”
© BELGIUM
Comeback
Her announcement made a lot of waves in the volleyball world, Van Gestel explains. “It seemed like it was my birthday, I received so many messages. And of course a lot of people ask me if I would ever consider a comeback. I do not want and cannot give a definitive answer on this yet. I first want to find out whether life without volleyball is really something for me… So it is certainly not that I will start playing volleyball again next month. In my head I stopped.”
However, sport remains part of her life. “But now I can decide for myself where, when and how I exercise, something I have missed in recent years. I started cycling a lot together with my boyfriend. We have even booked a cycling holiday. Running, padel: bring it on. Delicious. And also volleyball, but purely recreational. In any case, I will still keep in touch with the many friends from that sport.”
Yellow Tigers
As captain, Van Gestel was one of the key players of the national team. Her retirement means yet another loss for the Yellow Tigers, who have already seen half a dozen players at international level drop out in recent years. Most of them linked their forfeit to the reign of national coach Gert Vande Broek, a man who was suspended in 2023 for abuse of power and mentally transgressive behavior. Van Gestel has always supported the controversial trainer. “Belgium is a small country with a limited number of players. I have always given 500% to the Tigers. That remains a very nice project, with most of the key players still on board. Kris Vansnick is keeping it straight, so I’m not worried about that.”
© BELGIUM
Children’s dietitians
The Antwerp athlete will soon graduate as a nutritionist. Her new life will revolve around that diploma, she hopes. “I am now doing my last internship. During those volleyball years, I spread my studies over several years. At one point I thought I would quit, but a teacher convinced me. And now I really want to become a dietitian for children.”