Cees Lok

Cees began his career at Wageningen before he entered service at NEC. There, he became a stable and highly acclaimed defender who would finally play 230 league games for the Nijmegen club. He managed to score 57 goals in these matches. Because of his height he was also often used as a striker at NEC. His final years there were marked by injuries. Following yet another return after a serious injury, he managed to score the winning goal against Feyenoord in his comeback match. As a player, he gained the nickname The Living Legend from the NEC supporters.

NEC

After his playing career he remained under contract with NEC and he became the coach of the second team. After Johan Neeskens was fired as head coach at NEC in December 2004, Lok succeeded him, initially as caretaker coach. However, he completed the season successfully. On 10 May 2005, he then attained his Professional Football Coach Diploma, following an internship at both Arsenal and NEC. After having been head coach of NEC for one year and despite the good performance of the club, he unexpectedly resigned from his post and left, due to differences in perspective between him and the board.

NAC and IJsselmeervogels

In January 2006, it was announced that Lok was appointed new coach of NAC Breda, who had sacked their manager Ton Lokhoff a few days before. Soon after his arrival, he had a clash with Pierre van Hooijdonk, who left to join Feyenoord in the winter break. When appointing Lok, NAC were already struggling at the bottom of the Eredivisie, but even under Lok were not able to break out of this position, and the club were forced to play promotion/relegation play-offs. Following a 0–0 draw in the first match of the play-offs against TOP Oss, Lok was dismissed less than four months after his appointment. The main reason, as indicated by the NAC board, was that the relationship between Lok and a number of players had been disrupted. In October 2006, Lok was appointed as head coach at IJsselmeervogels in the Saturday Hoofdklasse. In his first season as…