Kuyt is a wing-forward. Huntelaar is a striker. Huntelaar has 41 club goals so far this season. He has 31 international goals. Mediocre?
Kuyt has had a great career, esp considering his limited talent. In the here and now though, I'd be suprised if he got a big role at Euro 2012 let alone beyond that. Post 70s football still adheres to the Dutch football school established by the likes of Michels and Cruyff. The Dutch Surinamese learnt their football in the Dutch football tradition created by those two. That's sort of the point. Dutch football's results in the 1970s prove that 'a Surinamese gene pool' (which by the way is a racist thing to say but there you go) had nothing to do with it. Like I said I don't really get this 'we have more stars than you' debate. Who cares (unless you live your football through computer games that is). Football's a team sport. The main strength of Dutch football has always been football intelligence more so than individual skill. Every football nation of some significance has had great stars. Very few have innovated the game the way Holland has though. I'm far more proud of that than of the number of stars we've produced.
Is that enough to be 5 times better than Uruguay though? I would say a fair statement is that Holland produces twice as many good players compared to Uruguay over the past 20 or so years. If you want to go back further than that, your argument gets worse, not better. Unless you conveniently start the clock in 1971.
He learned his trade mainly at Barcelona, so, for the sake of this discussion, he's a product of Spanish (Catalan to be fair) football.
Surinam is/was a country of 450000 citizens. That is 10% of the population of London for your info. And this is how it compares with the other South American countries. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_South_American_countries_by_population I bet nations as England ("The empire on which the sun never sets"), France, Germany (with their hijacking of Turks), Portugal, Italy and so on had a greater 'foreign' talent pool to pick from. The 'secret' of Dutch success was their approach to the game. It was a weakness as well but also a strength, because you exploit a niche which others did not vacate. 'Funnily', other nations moved their education-system recently towards the Dutch approach while the Dutch themselves start to be a bad parody of Germany TBH. A bad move, because some circumstances are more favourable for 'classic' Dutch football than it has ever been. The in some aspects rather strict refereeing is an example, to start with. The paradox is that football has become more physical but the refereeing is less lenient at the same time. Unfortunately, prophets as Cruijff and Van Basten are by some seen as retarded nostalgic men thus maybe over 40 years Uruguay will overtake Holland. It is an scenario I'll not exclude.
This is how David Winner put this: The book has some serious errors though and it overstates, in my opinion, the influence of Reynolds and Buckingham on the later developments - It were two great managers though, that is not the point. In sum: the qualities were already there but it was not fully matured. Moulijn and Wilkes were indeed two great exceptions. Moulijn was very good in some games against Benfica and Wilkes showed his class in Italy and Spain of course. That is also a reason why Cruijff regarded Wilkes as better than him because Wilkes grew up in a 'third world nation', in terms of football. Cruijff grew up in a 'developing nation' as well and met bumps on the road ahead, which he had to clean up, but the tide was ultimately with him and not against him, which was the case with Wilkes. I mean, the FA tried to ostracise Wilkes! But this is not to say that Cruijff had an easy youth, in contrary. Cruijff had a great influence on the development-process as well of course; he used the benefits of the changing times, he was a product of his time, but steered the process too. Personally, I'd say that Hungary has produced the greatest amount of talents per capita. People often remember the 1950s but Hungary had quite a few good players in the whole 1930-1980 period I think.
This is quite a stretch. Messi his dribbling style is very Argentinian and un-Dutch. If you look at the great Dutch dribblers of the past, they had not the 'Gambetta' style of dribbling, which Messi has. Furthermore, Holland used to produce all-round forwards. That is: forwards who know and can execute every aspect of the game on a decent level. This is partly related to the fact that the Dutch have difficulties in accepting authority, 'natural' leaders as Cruijff, Gullit and Van Basten had to earn it over and over again - leadership by example, leadership by showing. Therefore, the 'real' creative Dutch leaders had a decent all-round package in their repertoire. But also a 'soldier' as Kluivert, a very underrated player by the way, was an all-round two-footed player. I think you know what I'll argue: of course Messi is great and otherworldly, of another galaxy in some aspects, but he is for my taste not a complete player. But that is my personal opinion, it is not the truth of course.
No, he learned what makes him an extraordinary player, what separates him from Iniesta, Xavi, Pedro, etc. in the streets of Argentina: the "picardia" to make the unexpected, the same footballing culture that engendered Moreno, Corbatta, DiStefano, Maradona, Sivori, Bertoni, Caniggia, Ortega, etc. If he were the product of the Catalan system, why hasn't Barcelona, or Spain, ever given a player like Messi before? What differentiates Messi from the rest is precisely that he is Argentine.
Because Cruijff his philosophy was installed in 1991, after a two-years development process. After Cruijff came Robson and Van Gaal who broke this a bit down; Van Gaal reshaped some parts of the education-system in a bad manner. The experimentation of Van Gaal was stopped and re-winded in 2000/2001. Since then, Cruijff his philosophy is the guideline. For the non-bolded part: I agree with you although the likes of Xavi, Fabregas, Iniesta etc. also possess a style/attributes which Messi doesn't have. It is clear for me, as stated by the ITV documentary too, that Messi benefited from Barcelona and became the player he is now thanks to Barcelona but he has also some traits from elsewhere obviously. Most notably the dribbling-style.
Of course Xavi and Iniesta have their own attributes, they will both be considered all-time greats after they retired. But just like Pele goes on a higher rank to Didi, or Cruyff to Neeskens, it is Messi who has the level to be top ten or so of all-time. Is it just that he happens to have been born in Argentina, or does his roots make him the special player of his generation? Seeing that Argentina gave us Maradona, DiStefano, Moreno, Pedernera, Sivori, it should be obvious it's the latter. Some people have just a hard time accepting that.
It's clear to me that Argentina have produced some great players. If you want to know my honest opinion I respect them a lot more than Brazil beyond the 1980s. The football is a lot more positive and joyful for lack of a better word. It's a mystery to me why Brazilians still are bigged up more as a matter of course almost.
Telling is the scene after the 1:0 against Milan last week. The camera showed Guardiola instructing Xavi, and only him. It are in the first place people like Xavi who embody the Barcelona values and culture, and possesses it in all of his fibres, not necessarily Messi.
Way off the track.the question is which country produces the highest quality ppayers per capita not who is the brain behind the greatest team of the era. I am sure Cesarini would have done the same with Pedernera not Moreno And Cesarini again to Boniperti not Sivori,Saachi to Baresi not Gullit,Menotti instructed Passarella not Kempes,Tele Santana instructed Cafu not Leonardo so great coaches have their marshals on the field. Who may not be the superstar so what
To start with: The smallest nations among the last 16 in World Cups 1954 and 1958 (treshold = 20 million): Northern Ireland 1958 --- ~1.4 million Paraguay 1958 --- ~1.6 million Uruguay 1954 --- ~2.3 million Wales 1958 --- ~2.5 million Switzerland 1954 --- ~4.9 million (hosts) Scotland 1954 --- ~5.1 million Scotland 1958 --- ~5.1 million Austria 1954 --- ~6.9 million Austria 1958 --- ~6.9 million Sweden 1958 --- ~7.4 million (hosts) Belgium 1954 --- ~8.8 million Hungary 1954 --- ~9.7 million Hungary 1958 --- ~9.8 million Czechoslovakia 1954 --- ~12.9 million Czechoslovakia 1958 --- ~13.3 million Yugoslavia 1954 --- ~16 million Yugoslavia 1958 --- ~18 million European championships in 1960 (last 8): Austria 1960 --- ~7 million Portugal 1960 --- ~8.8 million Czechoslovakia 1960 --- ~13.3 million Romania 1960 --- ~18.4 million
Last 16 World Cup, last 8 Euros (1962-1970) Luxembourg 1964 --- ~0.3 million Uruguay 1962 --- ~2.5 million Uruguay 1966 --- ~2.6 million Ireland 1964 --- ~2.8 million Uruguay 1970 --- ~2.8 million Israel 1970 --- ~2.9 million El Salvador 1970 --- ~3.3 million Denmark 1964 --- ~4.6 million Switzerland 1962 --- ~5.5 million Switzerland 1966 --- ~5.9 million Sweden 1964 --- ~7.7 million Chile 1962 --- ~7.9 million (hosts) Bulgaria 1962 --- ~8.0 million Sweden 1970 --- ~8.0 million Bulgaria 1966 --- ~8.1 million Bulgaria 1968 --- ~8.3 million Bulgaria 1970 --- ~8.4 million Chile 1966 --- ~8.6 million Portugal 1966 --- ~9.1 million Belgium 1970 ---- ~9.6 million Hungary 1962 --- ~10.0 million Hungary 1964 --- ~10.1 million Hungary 1966 --- ~10.1 million Hungary 1968 --- ~10.2 million North Korea 1966 --- ~12.4 million Peru 1970 --- ~13.4 million Czechoslovakia 1962 --- ~13.8 million Czechoslovakia 1970 --- ~14.3 Morocco 1970 --- ~15.3 million Colombia 1962 --- ~16.4 million Yugoslavia 1962 --- ~18.5 million Yugoslavia 1968 --- ~19.4 million
Players like freakin' Kuijt or Van der Vaart are mentioned to underline the per capita strength of Holland. Three years ago, the trend was 'where are the Dutch? They haven't produce anything significant in the last 10-20 years.' That is why I mentioned it up schwuppe.
Anyways, the whole underlying premise discussed in this thread is shaky to begin with. I was awaiting someone to bring it up, but since noone yet has I guess I will. So Brazil has to have 12 times as many footballing greats as Holland to be on par with them? They probably do anyways, but the point is that while population size may be a relevant variable, there are other factors that also influence success, some of them specifically advantageous to smaller countries: a more integrated recruiting system (who knows how many potential stars playing in Amazonian terrains went unnoticed for Brazil), the chance to develop more team cohesion due to their smaller depth, the underdog spirit, a ligher load of lesser expectations, etc. By the way, what is the result of 5/0? My calculator gives an error.
Thruout hisory maybe Holland - Netherland recently ... Cyprus with Apoel in UCL from 1st division, amomg 4 leagues (<900000 POPULATION)