As a coach, Van Nistelrooy has maintained his passion for perfection.
After retiring from playing in 2012, he became a coach in the PSV academy and was promoted to first team manager in 2022.
Van Nistelrooy resigned in 2023 After winning the Dutch Cup and finishing second in the Eredivisie in his only season as manager, there was no shortage of offers.
Instead, he took a year to learn from other coaches around the world at clubs such as Spanish giants Real Madrid and Argentinian giants Boca Juniors and River Plate.
“In that respect he is not a proud man, he is not arrogant. He wanted to share his own ideas with others,” Marcel van der Kraan, sports editor at Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf, told BBC Sport.
“On his dream football trip he attended all the big games. He talked to River Plate manager Martin Demichelis for hours about coaching.”
“He also went to experience the football culture. He told me that he was walking through La Boca in Buenos Aires and saw “The Eternity of Maradona” painted on the walls as a tribute to the Argentine legend.
“He said: 'You have to win the culture of a region'.”