West Brom summer signing Gianni Zuiverloon admits his participation in the Olympics may affect his prospects of breaking into the Baggies team if they make a flying start in the Premier League.
Zuiverloon will be representing Holland in Beijing and will definitely miss the league opener against Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium and possibly several more games if his country make good progress in the under-23 competition.
The £3.2million capture from Heerenveen is keen to make his mark at the Hawthorns after signing a three-year deal but knows he could be kept waiting should Tony Mowbray's side make their mark following their promotion from the Coca-Cola Championship.
Zuiverloon, 21, said: "I think I will miss the first two games perhaps and the first one is against Arsenal which is one of the greatest games in the competition.
"I have mixed feelings but the Olympics will be good and you can only play once there in your life. We hope we can go all the way in China. We are going for a medal as we have a very good team.
"Could it count against me if Albion start well? Yes, it might. They always say never change a winning team so if Albion make a good start then the manager doesn't need to change things.
"I will just have to work hard and show what I can do, I suppose if we won the gold medal it would help me.
"But, even so, if the other players are doing well then I won't be able to just come back into the team. It will be what the manager wants. I am an attacking defender and I want to play football."
