Copied my original post in the Euro 2012 thread and a little update about our defense. Oh this thread is to discuss about the players from Holland. Just about any update about Holland will be here.
Goalkeepers
Maarten Stekelenburg, 29 years old, AS Roma. Successor of Edwin van der Sar (one of the greatest goalkeepers Holland has had) and has already proven himself that he can save Holland from losing points. He's tall (1,97m), strong and has decent reflexes. Imo one of the top keepers in the world (top 5) normally (this season it's somewhat bad compared to before though).
Defense
This is Hollands biggest weakness and this could cost us the Euro Cup if you compare to the other top class countries participating.
John Heitinga, 29 years old, defender of Everton. He's the only one in our defense that has played a reasonable season compared to the others.
Joris Mathijsen, 32 years old, defender of Malaga CF. He's really old and not our best defender. Compared to the last generations he's one of our weakest central defenders we've had in Holland. Very slow and afaik hasn't been playing much for Malaga.
Erik Pieters (Injured), 23 years old, left back of PSV. He's supposedly our best defender on the left back but he's injured now. This is our biggest weakness in the defense. He's slow, loses his duels a lot and makes poor decisions. He's only here because there is no one better.
Jethro Willems, 18 years old, left back of PSV and replacement for Erik Pieters. He's a great talent, young, fast and is very offense minded like Gregory van der Wiel. He still plays with a bit of arrogance but that's more due to his experience as he's only 18 years old. He's only here because we don't have anyone better and he'll be the one who has to stop players like Ozïl, Ronaldo, Nani which everyone in Holland is sooooo affraid of.
Gregory van der Wiel, 24 years old, right back of Ajax. He's Hollands best right back and most talented players. His defending isn't bad but it isn't that strong either. He attacks from the flanks a lot and he does it really well like Dani Alves for Barcelona. He's fast, agile and can give decent passes. The combination with Robben will definitely make this one of our stronger sides on the right.
Midfield
This is where it starts for Holland
Rafael van der Vaart, 29 years old, Tottenham Hotspurs. He's one of our top players in the team and a world class player but is still sitting on our bench because there are better players on his position which is the left half. His strong points are his insight, positioning and his deadly passes and also quite agile in the tight spaces. His weak point is that he's slow, gets injured a lot and most of all his condition isn't strong as he can't play a full game normally.
Mark van Bommel, 35 years old, AC Milan. I think he's our oldest player in the team but still such a world class defensive mid fielder. He's strong, not too bad on the speed but most of all he's cunning. He plays extremely cunning mind games and physical tricks on his opponents. He plays the referee to get more leeway for making fouls. One of the running engines of our team and in the last World Cup as well.
Nigel de Jong, 27 years old, Manchester City. With Mark van Bommel he'll be the defensive block on the midfield stopping all attacks. He's reasonably fast, strong and his defensive skills are good as well. He makes a lot of fouls that terrifies his opponents and in some way he doesn't get punished heavily for it imo. If you don't watch out he'll break your legs and smiles with it. He's Holland's B.A. Baraccus. Weak points are his intelligence as he makes bad decisions most of the times and he gets emotional quite fast. So getting him out of his rhythm is done quickly.
Ibrahim Affelay, 26 years old, Barcelona. One of Hollands biggest talents. He usually plays left half/left forward striker depending on the lineup. He's fast, has good passes, strong on the ball but is very easy to get injured. He has been missing almost the entire season for Barcelona but hopefully he'll be in shape for the Euro Cup because he can make a difference. There aren't any major weak points in his play as he helps defending and his offense is really good and doesn't lose the ball that much.
Wesley Sneijder, 27 years old, Internazionale. Offensive central midfielder. He has been playing quite bad current season and hasn't been in top shape. Normally when he's in shape he's one of the best players in the world. His strong points are his passes, he is dual legged and has a powerful shot. Weak point is that he's small so he isn't strong in the air.
Dirk Kuyt, 32 years old, Liverpool FC. Right half of Holland. Not much to say about him. He's a runner and he probably runs the most of the team. He helps defending a lot and when our right back van der Wiel is attacking he's usually defending. He usually has the preference over Arjen Robben by our coach (crazy isn't it?) on the right half position.
Arjen Robben, 28 years old, Bayern Munchen. Right half of Holland. He's one of our top3 players in the team and is left legged. World class player as he can beat almost any player when it's 1v1 if he's in shape. Currently he isn't in his best shape from what I've seen so far. His strong points are his speed, his precise shots and his ability to pass multiple opponents. His weak points is that he's usually injured, not strong and his defensive skills are bad.
Offense
Here comes probably the 2 most in form strikers on the planet that Holland luckily has in 1 team But our coach will probably not use these 2 together in 1 team as there's only 1 spot for a striker.
Robin van Persie, 28 years old, Arsenal. Forward striker of Holland and recently crowned Player of the year in the EPL. Not our strongest striker in the team but the better player overall for Holland. He's fast, has strong shots, good passes, strong on the ball, agile too much to name tbh His weak point? Well the only weak point I would say is that he doesn't score much for Holland :/ He is not our best striker for Holland and hopefully he can repeat what he did for Arsenal at the Euro Cup.
Klaas-Jan Huntelaar, 28 years old, Schalke 04. Forward striker of Holland and a bench sitter because we have Robin. He's a real goalgetter and currently the number one striker in Germany. He's reasonably fast, decent shots, decent passes pretty much decent on all but 1 thing. He's the best when it comes to positioning in front of the goal. He's on the right place on the right time almost every time for Holland. One of Hollands most scoring striker and it's crazy that he's sitting on our bench. His weak point is that compared to RVP he's the worse player in overall player skills and which is the reason he's never in the starting lineup when RVP can play.
Regarding Mathijsen - don't be fooled in the bashing campaign the media has unleashed on this lad. He played 28 matches for Malaga which ended 4th in the Spain this season... so he can handle that level.
vd Vaart - reason he isn't playing isn't because we have "better players". Van Marwijk doesn't dare play with both Sneijder and vd Vaart, and systematically picks Sneijder over vd Vaart. Not because he's a better player (look at the past season, vd Vaart was the hero of the Spurs, while Sneijder barely played a role at Inter).
Afellay, being 26, no longer can be deemed a "talent". It's time for him to excel and prove what he's worth.
Kuijt - great worker, more so than runner. Able to recapture the ball instantly after a failed offense, puts pressure on the foundation of the opponents attack. Also, he just switched to Fenerbahce.
Finally, I can't believe you don't mention Tim Krul and Michel Vorm... Both of them might have surpassed Stekelenburg this year. We won't yet see them play much this tournament, van Marwijk being pretty conservative and shunning change, but hell - the two best goalies in the worlds toughest competition! (Yes Joe, I'm a bit biased
Always entertaining to watch the Dutch, Im especially looking forward to their opening game against Portugal (cards galore 2006). I think Holland is one of the best teams by far, and they could very well win it this time.
Also regarding Kuyt he is a very underrated player who wins the ball back alot, is always ready for some one-touch attacking play, and has a habit of scoring important goals.
On June 05 2012 20:25 Passion wrote: Couple of comments & suggestions;
Regarding Mathijsen - don't be fooled in the bashing campaign the media has unleashed on this lad. He played 28 matches for Malaga which ended 4th in the Spain this season... so he can handle that level.
vd Vaart - reason he isn't playing isn't because we have "better players". Van Marwijk doesn't dare play with both Sneijder and vd Vaart, and systematically picks Sneijder over vd Vaart. Not because he's a better player (look at the past season, vd Vaart was the hero of the Spurs, while Sneijder barely played a role at Inter).
Afellay, being 26, no longer can be deemed a "talent". It's time for him to excel and prove what he's worth.
Kuijt - great worker, more so than runner. Able to recapture the ball instantly after a failed offense, puts pressure on the foundation of the opponents attack. Also, he just switched to Fenerbahce.
Finally, I can't believe you don't mention Tim Krul and Michel Vorm... Both of them might have surpassed Stekelenburg this year. We won't yet see them play much this tournament, van Marwijk being pretty conservative and shunning change, but hell - the two best goalies in the worlds toughest competition! (Yes Joe, I'm a bit biased
I just think he's too old, but so was v. Bronckhorst in 2010 as well so we'll see. His experience is good to have though but I like the more footballing defenders what you see at Ajax with Vertonghen and Alderweireld so it's a preference of play style so I'm not going into that discussion :p
I like VDV more because he's performed better past 2 seasons compared to Sneijder. Sneijder is a better player no doubt yes but I prefer to use players that are in form now not 2 years ago.
Regarding Affelay yes I completely agree and this tournament he really has to shine to show his worth nothing to argue against that :p
Kuijt, well I think you've figured it out now that I like the attacking style much more rather than the result football style. Kuijt is a great worker yes, but I rarely see him go pass his opponent and pass the ball. Not that he never does but just rarely or maybe because he's been ordered that Van der Wiel has to pass him so that he can give it to him I don't know. I'm only observing that the majority of the time he's usually defending than attacking.
Regarding Krul en Vorm, I was actually only naming the players that were going to form the starting elven and the few people who would most likely be either the standard sub in a game :p
When I think of the total football I think of 1998. That was my first World Cup and what I saw was one of the best football in my lifetime with players like Kluivert and Bergkamp. It's just a shame that we don't see that football style in Holland anymore since like 04 or so. I mean we've basically invented that style and Spain has been using that style past few years and look what it got them so I don't see why it couldn't be succesful and also don't come with the argument of we don't have quality players because we actually do and I think all non-Dutch people can agree with that (maybe a bit less with our defense).
On June 05 2012 21:33 Bumblebee wrote: You are going to get smacked in your opening game!
Oh you're on! I'm not underestimating Denmark but WE WILL CRUSH YOU! We are obligated to do that tbh
On June 05 2012 21:36 kyllinghest wrote: Always entertaining to watch the Dutch, Im especially looking forward to their opening game against Portugal (cards galore 2006). I think Holland is one of the best teams by far, and they could very well win it this time.
Also regarding Kuyt he is a very underrated player who wins the ball back alot, is always ready for some one-touch attacking play, and has a habit of scoring important goals.
Good luck!
Our opening game is against Denmark not Portugal. I think you meant the final game in the group stages because that's when we play against Portugal.
without Emmanuelson or Anita in the team but with Willems who won't be able to play all games at a high level we are doomed..... Luckily even with a top Willems we will lose from Germany so lets hope he has his off day against Germany so we will still advance from the groupstages.
And we will prolly play boring.....
Just let VDV play together with v Bommel & Affelay on the midfield, and v Persie, Robben & Huntelaar as attackers and we will succeed.... but the way we play now we just will get crushed by Germany, Spain & even France.
On June 05 2012 22:47 michielbrands wrote: without Emmanuelson or Anita in the team but with Willems who won't be able to play all games at a high level we are doomed..... Luckily even with a top Willems we will lose from Germany so lets hope he has his off day against Germany so we will still advance from the groupstages.
And we will prolly play boring.....
Just let VDV play together with v Bommel & Affelay on the midfield, and v Persie, Robben & Huntelaar as attackers and we will succeed.... but the way we play now we just will get crushed by Germany, Spain & even France.
Have more faith And let's pray we get through the groupstages. I'm skeptical but I don't see it out of the possibility that we can make it.
Hmm I agree with Van Basten it was I think that you have to put Huntelaar as 9, Persie on 10, Robben left and Sneijder right. Or atleast let RVP and Huntelaar play together they deserve it it's pretty ridiculous that Affelay who didn't play the whole year gets picked over Huntelaar whose had his best season in his career.
An interesting read about the whole RvP vs. the Hunter discussion can be found here!
Although I don't think the statistics they're showing are too reliable. Wins is a real bad statistic to measure the influence of a single player in a team game and the sample sizes are low. Still i was surprised to see the statistics and kind of turned from the Hunterlaar camp to the van Persie camp. I still think Sneijder/RvP is a bad combo though and I would prefer vd Vaart/RvP. Then again I think Sneijder is the most overated player in the Dutch team anyway. Not only now he had a shit season at Inter, but even in his prime during the WC10 he was overated imho.
I am somewhat scared of Denmark because last time we were destroyed by Russia when our team severly underestimated them. Also I would like to see Huntelaar instead of RvP .
I obviously don't have as much information as you dutch guys, so could someone shed some light upon why you guys prefer Huntelaar to RvP? van Persie has been totally unstoppable this season! He is an immense finisher, has very good movement, great technique, and he is also very good at creating chances for his teammates.
Huntelaar is a great finisher, and a very smart player; but overall van Persie is so much better! Does RvP not fit into the team?
Our coach choose RvP so our opinion doesn't really matter. The general opinion was too let them play together, but Van Marwijk as a 'holy' system that he didn't change for the last 4 years. We play with RvP now cause Robben on the right side won't give much assists which would suck for Huntelaar. Also Affelay and RvP work together really well.
It will be either Willems or Schaars in the starting lineup, I prefer Willems since Schaars has no idea what he's doing at that position.
On June 06 2012 07:37 kyllinghest wrote: I obviously don't have as much information as you dutch guys, so could someone shed some light upon why you guys prefer Huntelaar to RvP? van Persie has been totally unstoppable this season! He is an immense finisher, has very good movement, great technique, and he is also very good at creating chances for his teammates.
Huntelaar is a great finisher, and a very smart player; but overall van Persie is so much better! Does RvP not fit into the team?
RvP hasn't always performed as well in the orange shirt.. As one of the guys mentioned before it can be somewhat of a swing and a miss..
I've always seen the Dutch more as under-acheivers (outside of the last WC of course). I started following Holland in 2000, and ever since losing to Italy in the Euro, I've always felt they just can't seem to pull it together when it counts most...even last Euro I was thrilled when the beat France and Italy (sweet revenge!), then fail hard against Russia. Hoping this year is different and they can make a strong showing. Really as long as they beat Portugal I'll be at least somewhat happy.
On June 06 2012 16:48 Enel wrote: Persie sucks, its up 2 robben how far the dutch will go.
nah, Robben isn't playing well lately and every opponent knows how to play against him. Even against Northern Ireland he had trouble getting past his marker.
The entire team has to play well to get far. But especially RvP has to prove himself now.
I feel it's always like they can win in theory everytime, but it just never happens. I'm not gonna be too big of a fan (I never am of our national team), last time I got sucked into the hype and got disappointed a lot (failed my driving theory test the morning after aswell..). They will screw up at some point or decide to spend half the match passing the ball between their defenders and die to one counter attack.
I think this video kind of speaks for itself. How can you possibly say that? lol
Well an awful lot of his goals were spoon fed to him and he "just" finished with a well placed shot or header. I put the quotes in there cause that's a great talent for a striker to have, not saying he's bad or anything, but he's not the kind of player that will win a game on his own when his team doesn't know what to do and are just sitting on their asses. The dutch don't have a player like that anymore. I think their last such player was Bergkamp. Oh, they do have rafael van der vaart which is imo top 3 world. Dunno why he's not a starter for you guys. What a shame.
I think this video kind of speaks for itself. How can you possibly say that? lol
Well an awful lot of his goals were spoon fed to him and he "just" finished with a well placed shot or header. I put the quotes in there cause that's a great talent for a striker to have, not saying he's bad or anything, but he's not the kind of player that will win a game on his own when his team doesn't know what to do and are just sitting on their asses. The dutch don't have a player like that anymore. I think their last such player was Bergkamp. Oh, they do have rafael van der vaart which is imo top 3 world. Dunno why he's not a starter for you guys. What a shame.
Hmm, Huntelaar is our finishing striker, Van Persie(inform, will explain that later) can definitely win a game for the team. When Van Persie still played at Feyenoord it was like all or nothing, he was super good one game and the next game he was complete shit. This changed abit when he came to Arsenal, with sick players around him(Gervinho, Walcott, Arteta. Sick for assists.) he developed himself to a finisher(well placed shot or header goals). I think that if he plays a game like some he played at Feyenoord(Ofc, he is better now then at Feyenoord) he can absolutely decide a match. The only problem is that we have Van de Vaart, Sneijder, Robben and Huntelaar aswell, at Arsenal he is the Absolute star, at Oranje he isnt, maybe that counts aswell.
Point is; RvP is an absolute beast that can definitely decide a match!
I think this video kind of speaks for itself. How can you possibly say that? lol
Well an awful lot of his goals were spoon fed to him and he "just" finished with a well placed shot or header. I put the quotes in there cause that's a great talent for a striker to have, not saying he's bad or anything, but he's not the kind of player that will win a game on his own when his team doesn't know what to do and are just sitting on their asses. The dutch don't have a player like that anymore. I think their last such player was Bergkamp. Oh, they do have rafael van der vaart which is imo top 3 world. Dunno why he's not a starter for you guys. What a shame.
dude, van Persie single handedly give a very poor Arsenal team 3rd spot on this year EPL you should see his match winning goal against everton
van Der Vart will occupy the same space as Snejder in the current set up, so unless Dutch change their formation, unlikely he will start
Won't happen, but I can't see why we can't play vd Vaart and Sneijder in one team. Just put one of them next to v. Bommel and put Nigel de Jong in central defense instead of Mathijsen. Spain plays with Xavi and Iniesta and play possession football to counter the attack of the opposition. There's no reason why we can't play a somewhat similar style with the players we have.
Meh, Nigel de Jong central defender? naaah, way to much yellow/red cards and not as solid as Mathijsen imo. I think the defending midfield is really strong, Nigel de Jong and Mark van Bommel clean up so many balls. vd Vaart and Sneijder are not the same as Xavi and Iniesta. Xavi is more a defending then a attacking midfielder, Iniesta is similar to Sneijder/ vd Vaart, thats why Spain can play with both and Oranje cannot Spain has Fabregas aswell, he is sub because Iniesta plays on that position, similar to the Sneijder/ vd Vaart situation.
On June 07 2012 18:38 Deadstrider wrote: Meh, Nigel de Jong central defender? naaah, way to much yellow/red cards and not as solid as Mathijsen imo. I think the defending midfield is really strong, Nigel de Jong and Mark van Bommel clean up so many balls. vd Vaart and Sneijder are not the same as Xavi and Iniesta. Xavi is more a defending then a attacking midfielder, Iniesta is similar to Sneijder/ vd Vaart, thats why Spain can play with both and Oranje cannot Spain has Fabregas aswell, he is sub because Iniesta plays on that position, similar to the Sneijder/ vd Vaart situation.
De Jong can play without taking red or yellow cards if he wants he has done it before for multiple clubs.
Apparently there were 20k people watching at the public training of Oranje pretty crazy when you think about it.
On June 07 2012 17:50 Twisted wrote: Won't happen, but I can't see why we can't play vd Vaart and Sneijder in one team. Just put one of them next to v. Bommel and put Nigel de Jong in central defense instead of Mathijsen. Spain plays with Xavi and Iniesta and play possession football to counter the attack of the opposition. There's no reason why we can't play a somewhat similar style with the players we have.
I like how you want to take Mathijssen out when Heitinga has been showing such a terrible performance so far. And the discussion hasn't been whether VDV and Sneijder can play in the same team for ages, the current discussion is about having RVP and Huntelaar in the same team. VDV got subbed in twice in the last two games, and he didn't show anything. Huntelaar should play, and so should RVP:
....................Stekelenburg...................... ..Kuijt - Vlaar - Mathijssen - anyone......... ...............De Jong - Sneijder.................... ..Affelay/Narsingh - Van Persie - Robben... .........................Huntelaar.......................
Just as I though, Holland will very likely beat Portugal since Portugal can't turtle as well as Denmark or Germany. And when you go attack vs attack with this Holland team, its not gonna end well.
Wow, really? Netherlands defence is so bad :| Have they never heard about offside traps before? Maybe actually do it instead of letting ronaldo get the ball?
On June 18 2012 04:22 Roflhaxx wrote: Wow, really? Netherlands defence is so bad :| Have they never heard about offside traps before? Maybe actually do it instead of letting ronaldo get the ball?
At least the ref is calling all potential fouls on portugal and letting the Netherlands run their ball atm
On June 18 2012 02:34 Brow23 wrote: I hope Ronaldo finishes Holland and sends them home, finally! But don't be sad, you would, no matter what, got crushed in the Semis.
My hope came true! RONALDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Going 0-3 is very disappointing, but at least the Dutch TL-posters were classy during the EC so far. Something I sadly can't say about all German posters ^^
Well that was a disastrous tournament for the Netherlands... I don't even know where to begin with my criticism of the team, there were so many issues.
There has been a great deal of criticism of Bert van Marwijk in the Dutch press, and certainly he deserves some blame because it is his task get the team to perform their best, but I feel the lions share of the blame falls solely on the players. There is only so much a coach can do, and in the end, the players need to follow his instructions and perform on the field themselves.
The simple fact is that the team was lazy, arrogant and mentally frail. The defensive failures of this team was not the inadequacy of a few individuals (though many like to blame Willems for example), it was the inadequacy of the team as a whole. The amount of space between the lines was horrific and the amount of time and space allowed to opponents right outside the Dutch penalty box was even worse. The lines need to play much closer together, in both attack and defense. If Holland has the ball, the back line needs to push up so that there is not acres of space for the opponent to run in to if we lose possession. The back line was too afraid to push up and that caused a lot of problems for the as a whole because it forced our attacking players to track back by inane amounts to try and stymie a counter or to help recover the ball. That brings me to my second problem defensively. There was zero pressure applied to opponents when they had the ball. They were given all the freedom in the world to try and measure a perfect through ball for their strikers, and happily did so on several occasions. Both German goals and the first Portuguese goal could have been prevented by simply applying pressure on the man with the ball. Instead, the Dutch watched and suffered. Watching the ball, and running back with the attacker became ever more common for Holland rather then committing to a duel to try and win the ball back and it was terrible to watch. Only Nijel de Jong was capable of winning his duels and recovering the ball with any regularity. These are simple footballing rules and I can guarantee you that this is not a coaching error, but rather a case of players being to lazy or disinterested to follow instructions. Finally, in all three games, Holland started fairly positively, for 20 minutes against both Denmark and Germany, and for 10 against Portugal. As soon as they suffered a set back however, the team completely capitulated. In none of the three games were they able to recover from conceding a goal. It is shocking how mentally weak this team was. They deserved completely to lose and be booted from Euro2012.
What will happen now is anybody's guess. Bert van Marwijk is contracted until 2016, but after this disastrous tournament he may be fired or he may resign. I think it will depend on what exactly happened between the players and the coach at Euro2012. Many reports are surfacing of various cases of infighting in the Dutch camp. Huntelaar was apparently threatened to be ejected from the hotel if he didn't shut his mouth and there are also reports of cliques forming around Robin van Persie and Wesley Sneijder (no surprise there). It is also reported that Robben screamed at the coach to 'shut his damn mouth' when he beseeched him to track back to help defend (in fairness to Robben, he frequently did track back, yet got no support in the attack) and that seems unacceptable to me. If the KNVB feels that Bert van Marwijk still has control of the team and he still wants to coach it for the WC2014 then I think he will stay on. I personally don't disagree with his tactics after watching this tournament conclude, but he absolutely needs to adjust his personnel. He needs to resolve the issues between the players, and if they cannot be resolved (seems likely) discard some of the old guard, even if it is the likes of Sneijder or RvP. Furthermore, he needs to give a chance to many of the younger players or some players that are currently on the bench. In my opinion, Kevin Strootman could have been a fine compromise between Mark van Bommel and Rafa van de Vaart. Strootman can defend and recover the ball (unlike VdV) and still has the ability to push the ball forward, yet he was not utilized once this tournament. In this regard, Bert needs to do better.
If it were up to me for WC2014 I would continue to form a team around these 4 players :
Wesley Sneijder Robin van Persie Arjen Robben Nijel de Jong
I would drop these players immediately :
Rafael van de Vaart Klaas-Jan Huntelaar Mark van Bommel
I would look to complete the midfield and attack with some of (though not limited to)the following players :
Ibrahim Afellay (as a midfielder, not a winger) Kevin Strootman Eljero Elia Jordy Clasie Ola John Adam Maher Luciano Narsingh Vurnon Anita (as a midfielder, not a left back) Luuk de jong (or another young striker to back up RvP)
The back 4 is up in the air in my opinion. They looked terrible in this tournament but a lot of the blame can be given to the team rather then just the back 4. However, there is certainly room for improvement and in addition to what we already have there may be a number of other options available :
Ricardo van Rhijn (right back) Stefan de Vrij (central defender) Urby Emmanualson (left winger, maybe can shift to left back) Douglas (central defender) Erick Pieters (left back, injured this euro2012) Nick Viergever (central defender)
There are many more players Holland could try in the defense. None of them stand out as splendid options right now but I think it will be necessary to try them out and perhaps we get lucky and find someone that really steps up and clicks with the team. It is going to have to look at youth in this regard.
To conclude, the national team put in an embarrassing display this tournament, not really because the tactics were all wrong, but because they didn't follow instructions properly and were lazy when things didn't go their way. There are significant issues within the team spirit and that needs to be fixed for the next challenge (WC2014) by any means necessary. Some of the core of these team will still be excellent footballers in the tail end of their prime and will be utilized, while some youngsters will hopefully be ready to take on a starting role in the team to replace our older players. It's hard to say if Bert van Marwijk will be residing over that job (it's hard to really see who could replace him) after this debacle but personally I hope he stays and helps rebuild the team. I think he is a good coach, and his past success' speak for itself. He is pragmatic and I think he can do a good job if some of the old guard are still willing to work with him.
Panta, nice analysis! I'm not sure whether you can just ditch Huntelaar and VdV like that, but the suggestions seems ok. Problem may be that a lot of the newer players have little to no international experience, which can be problematic when under pressure. Something like this will leave us with a very young and frail looking defense again:
Personally, I think we need to change formation too. 4-2-3-1 is too lame, 4-1-2-3 (german) is better, 4-3-3 is the good old dutch winger style, but 3-4-3 (cruijffian) would be awesome too. As he says: If you're not good at something, you shouldn't do it.
Perhaps it's a bit harsh to ditch them, especially Huntelaar because he can still be a great player for Oranje. I feel like if Bert van Marwijk stays on as coach however both of them will be dumped from the team because they caused so many problems. I understand their frustrations at not being in the starting line up but you need to be professionals and do what is best for the national team.
A lot of reports are coming out of the Dutch press (no doubt half of them are completely unfounded or half-truths) that bring to light some of the problems within the team. Huntelaar especially but also Van de Vaart apparently caused a big stink about not being in the basis and the coach get incredibly fed up with it, to the point of threatening to send Huntelaar back home.
Other reports coming out :
Gregory van der Wiel was apparently more interested in his new clothing line and his music then in football. He rarely spoke to the rest of the team and they were irritated by that.
Mark van Bommel was not respected as captain of the team and was snidely referred to as "assisstant-coach", no doubt in reference to the fact that he is van Marwijk's son in law.
Afellay was outrageously arrogant because he plays (haha...) at Barcelona. He was heard asking in a mocking tone "Where do you play?".
Robin van Persie too was arrogant repeatedly saying how he was the best player in the premier league.
Johnny Heitinga leaked information about the team to his wife who is a journalist in an effort to help her land a job with RTL.
I also read that there were two cliques that formed behind Wesley Sneijder and Robin van Persie. Sneijder group wanted to play more traditional Dutch football while the van Persie group preferred to play with van Marwijk's style.
Wesley Sneijder was apparently the only player who tried to mediate all the dissent within the group and really cared about winning the Euro2012.
Now, I take all this with a grain of salt since most of this information comes from Johan Derksen at Voebal International, but I do believe there is a core of truth to a lot of these accusations, and this really showed on the field. Holland looked uninterested and disorganized, and ultimately, mentally frail. This would seem to indicate some serious issues within the team. I guess it's just like old times.
Sneijder's part of the story, as posted above, is of course not the whole story. But not at least we know what Sneidjer thought.
I don't understand the love of vMarwijk for Afellay. He played a bad last season for PSV. Really below his level of talent. Then he somehow got a miracle transfer to Barcelona. At the WC he never got a starting spot in the squad. Then next season at Barcelona he almost never played and when he did they skipped him most of the time because he can't play the Barcelona style yet. Then he got injured and didn't play a whole season.
So then Euro 2012 comes and he is completely undisputed and doesn't even have to show he has match fitness to be selected? So puzzling. And now according to Sneijder he was one of the catalysts for all the troubles.
I always disliked vMarwijk even when he had super results. He was always praised for being able to create a team and being able to play result football. In the mean time the team played conservatively and combination play was non-existant.
On June 23 2012 04:29 Logros wrote: It sounds like they really need a new coach or all this shit will never be resolved.
I don't think this is all van Marwijk's fault. I place the blame largely on the players who are lazy, unprofessional and mentally weak. It's possible that van Marwijk has completely lost this team and that he will need to be replaced, but I certainly don't fault him for his tactics. We saw what happened in the game versus Portugal when you play without a midfield that is able to press and recover the ball, disaster. I blame van Marwijk for not properly assessing the players he had, namely van Bommel and Afellay. Mark van Bommel was over the hill and too slow to do his job in midfield which was clear as day especially in the game against Germany. Afellay is not match fit yet in my opinion, dealing with injury for a long time with Barcelona.
Regardless of these errors by van Marwijk, the players are responsible for effort, desire and passion on the pitch and they lacked all semblance of it. The Dutch team is incredibly talented on paper and they should have showed far, far, better then what they displayed in Euro2012.
I don't see a good replacement for van Marwijk at this time so I have a feeling that he will stay on if the situation with the players is still manageable. I hope in the preparation for WC2014 he shows the guts he should have shown in this tournament, and replaces several veteran players including malcontents like Huntelaar and Van de Vaart and Afellay if that is necessary.
On June 23 2012 03:26 Pantagruel wrote: Perhaps it's a bit harsh to ditch them, especially Huntelaar because he can still be a great player for Oranje. I feel like if Bert van Marwijk stays on as coach however both of them will be dumped from the team because they caused so many problems. I understand their frustrations at not being in the starting line up but you need to be professionals and do what is best for the national team.
A lot of reports are coming out of the Dutch press (no doubt half of them are completely unfounded or half-truths) that bring to light some of the problems within the team. Huntelaar especially but also Van de Vaart apparently caused a big stink about not being in the basis and the coach get incredibly fed up with it, to the point of threatening to send Huntelaar back home.
Other reports coming out :
Gregory van der Wiel was apparently more interested in his new clothing line and his music then in football. He rarely spoke to the rest of the team and they were irritated by that.
Mark van Bommel was not respected as captain of the team and was snidely referred to as "assisstant-coach", no doubt in reference to the fact that he is van Marwijk's son in law.
Afellay was outrageously arrogant because he plays (haha...) at Barcelona. He was heard asking in a mocking tone "Where do you play?".
Robin van Persie too was arrogant repeatedly saying how he was the best player in the premier league.
Johnny Heitinga leaked information about the team to his wife who is a journalist in an effort to help her land a job with RTL.
I also read that there were two cliques that formed behind Wesley Sneijder and Robin van Persie. Sneijder group wanted to play more traditional Dutch football while the van Persie group preferred to play with van Marwijk's style.
Wesley Sneijder was apparently the only player who tried to mediate all the dissent within the group and really cared about winning the Euro2012.
Now, I take all this with a grain of salt since most of this information comes from Johan Derksen at Voebal International, but I do believe there is a core of truth to a lot of these accusations, and this really showed on the field. Holland looked uninterested and disorganized, and ultimately, mentally frail. This would seem to indicate some serious issues within the team. I guess it's just like old times.
Derksen while a journalist promoting his magazine all the time is actually pretty well informed. Anyway I understand both huntelaar and vdv not being happy when they both played well this year but still get surpassed by affelay who played like 15 minutes. Van martijk could've known this would've caused a lot of unhappiness in the team.. This unhappiness only gets worse when the team starts losing Ofc I hear people say he isn't to blame but I disagree he made plenty of questionable decisions this euro which shouldn't be taken lightly.
Also you missed the news where robben was critical on the way they should've played but when people said he played bad he thought he would be the deciding factor in the game... Which greatly annoyed he rest of the team.
He has been a coach for like 6 years now. He always plays with 'his' system against every opponent. He can never change the tactics to change the match with a sub. He literally denies the existence of tactics.
Secondly, he managed the players wrong. He never faced the problem that some players will have to be benched during the WC or Euro. With the WC he had a Robben injury. With qualifying matches there was always someone injured or abscent. He never told the players what to expect. At least two players were tricked into being on the bench. If they knew they would be on the bench no matter what they both wouldn't have been available. But they were lied to by vMarwijk and they became mad when they found out they didn't have a shot at a spot in the team.
Van Marwijk's actions lead to the explosion of this team. And that's all he had going for him on the WC. He has world class players but the level of play at the WC was bad. Just go to the NOS page and watch all the matches of 2 years ago. Most people's memories will have been polluted by the memory of making the final. And then also look at the opponents. Minor countries like Japan, Denmark, Uruguay, Slovakia and then almost losing vs a very weak Brasil. They would have lost vs Germany at the WC. Germany doesn't have a Robben or a vPersie or a Sneijder. They only have Ozil, who back then was a little known player back then.
On June 23 2012 10:17 alderamin wrote: I think vMarwijk did almost everything wrong.
He has been a coach for like 6 years now. He always plays with 'his' system against every opponent. He can never change the tactics to change the match with a sub. He literally denies the existence of tactics.
Secondly, he managed the players wrong. He never faced the problem that some players will have to be benched during the WC or Euro. With the WC he had a Robben injury. With qualifying matches there was always someone injured or abscent. He never told the players what to expect. At least two players were tricked into being on the bench. If they knew they would be on the bench no matter what they both wouldn't have been available. But they were lied to by vMarwijk and they became mad when they found out they didn't have a shot at a spot in the team.
Van Marwijk's actions lead to the explosion of this team. And that's all he had going for him on the WC. He has world class players but the level of play at the WC was bad. Just go to the NOS page and watch all the matches of 2 years ago. Most people's memories will have been polluted by the memory of making the final. And then also look at the opponents. Minor countries like Japan, Denmark, Uruguay, Slovakia and then almost losing vs a very weak Brasil. They would have lost vs Germany at the WC. Germany doesn't have a Robben or a vPersie or a Sneijder. They only have Ozil, who back then was a little known player back then.
I disagree with this. You can make the excuse for every successful team on how they were fortunate. They all are in some way or another. To be sure, van Marwijk deserves blame, but not all of it. It is completely unacceptable the fashion in which the players behaved off the field and played on it. They deserve the most blame, they need to be professionals or they need to leave. In WC2010 Holland was excellent in defense and quite good in midfield, only in the attack were they woeful. I know a lot of people don't like to see this, but undeniably, it was successful. I have no issue with van Marwijk's tactics.
You are right in saying that van Marwijk could have prevented a lot of the problems that have occurred within the group by being more open with his players and communicating more and in that regard he utterly failed. But let's be honest, Huntelaar and Van der Vaart don't deserve to be in the team anyways. Robin van Persie and Wesley Sneijder are both superior players playing the same position in the team. Even if you are disappointed that you don't get a spot in the starting 11 you can never behave like they did. According to many reports, Huntelaar will never be selected for Oranje again (though I believe that is extreme and won't happen).
I think Bert made a number of errors in his selection but not in regards to VdV and Huntelaar. He should have used Strootman instead of Mark van Bommel and Narsingh on the flank instead of Afellay. Furthermore, there are a lot of great talents in the Eredivisie which he refuses to even consider. That is his biggest mistake in my opinion.
I'm curious who they're going to replace him with. de Boer should stay at Ajax (Hup Ajax!), and van Gaal, well, I don't know. Rijkaard is off doing his own thing too. I'm just sad and resigned over the individualism and infighting that continuously plagues our elftaal...
EPT
you WILL need it 
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