Sligo land New Zealand defender Nando Pijnaker on loan from Rio Ave

New Zealand defender Nando Pijnaker has joined Sligo Rovers on loan from Portuguese side Rio Ave for the 2022 SSE Airtricity League season.

Pijnaker has been capped at senior level by his country and was part of their Olympics team in 2021.

He has joined the Bit O' Red on a season-long loan move subject to international clearance.

The left-sided centre half turns 23 later this month and has previously played with Swiss outfit Grasshopper and had a loan spell with Danish outfit Helsingor from his parent club Rio Ave.

Pijnaker was born in the Netherlands but moved to New Zealand as a child. He started all four matches in the Olympics campaign and won four senior caps.

Pijnaker said: "It’s fantastic to be here. It’s a move that appealed to me and my main motivation is to play matches and help the team. I know the season is 36 games plus Cup football and European games so I know a chance will come at some point and I will take it.

"I spoke with the manager a couple of times and I was impressed by what he said. He had been speaking with my agent and I felt this was a good opportunity to go to a team playing European football at a good standard as well."

Sligo boss Liam Buckley has brought in a new defender after John Mahon was sold to St Johnstone last month.

Buckley said: "Nando has a lot of what you want from a defender in terms of his height, strength, his tackling and also his distribution as well. He’s coming into a new league but we feel he can do well here.

"We do have Garry Buckley, Shane Blaney, Robbie McCourt can slot in there and young Peter Maguire is coming through, but with the loss of John Mahon it was important to bring in another defender at centre-half.

"He’s come in with a good level of fitness and we’ll integrate