In April 2022, Derksen stated in his TV talkshow Vandaag Inside that during his tenure at Veendam he and the club's goalkeeper had "penetrated an unconscious woman with a candle"; according to Derksen "technically a prosecutor could have seen the act as rape."[39] Derksen qualified the incident as an "youthful error".[39] The following day, several prominent Dutch people stated that Derksen should be banned from TV.[40] Derksen himself refused to make apologies for the incident claiming "it happened in the zeitgeist of then."[41] On 27 April, he did retract the sexual assault story, claiming he had not penetrated the woman but had put a candle between her legs.