9781422275955

Martens was born on December 16, 1992, in Bergen, which is a city located in the Limburg province of the Netherlands. Martens enjoyed soccer from a young age. She joined Dutch club teams SC Heerenveen from 2009 to 2010 and VVV-Venlo from 2010 to 2011. The following season Martens played at Standard Liège in the Belgian First Division, which is the top women’s soccer league in Belgium.

After eight seasons playing in Holland, Belgium, Germany and Sweden, Martens now plays for the famous FC Barcelona in Spain.

Martens’s international career reached an early peak in the 2010 UEFA European Women's Under-19 Championship. It was during this competition that she scored four goals to tie Turid Knaak as the top scorer for the event. It was also this championship that really turned people on to Martens, who became an international women’s soccer celebrity overnight. Her fun, friendly, and humble interviews have become very popular on YouTube and other video sites. In 2011, she played in a friendly against China for her first match on the Netherlands's senior national team.

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