I saw Kisnorbo playing for Leeds in the League Cup game against 'Pool, and he looked very good in that game, so I'm not surprised he's amintained that form here. He's been one who's actually improved from what I've seen, whereas others seem to be treading water.
1. Bert van Marwijk gave Huntelaar (lone striker) faith by selecting him and starting him despite not playing much for his club Milan. He hasn't settled there and has yet to score. 2. The players had trouble sleeping due to the jetlag. It obviously effected them. 3. I have no doubt our accuracy will improve once the likes of van Nistelrooij will return in the striking role. Like the manager said, it's about the chances you can create. All in all you got more than you deserved. You really think you had a decent amount of possession? I disagree. Verbeek plays defensive, wanted to see the legs saved and didn't want to get flogged. With the players wide it was clearly an intend to play counter football. With a playmaker you would have been exposed more. Besides, dictating play against a good side seems too ambitious.
Kewell: Socceroos not ready yet http://www.theworldgame.com.au/socceroos/kewell-socceroos-not-ready-yet-244281 Good on Kewell giving a reality check, I for one wasn't satisfied with our performance. Sure defensively we were sound but all in all we just got outplayed and I reckon it got to Kewell during the game. Still a long way lads.
Don't stress over my comment about the dutch sides finishing, i know they're quality. Good stuff Harry. No point sugar coating it to give everyone a false sense of security. The way this team is playing now, they wouldn't even come close to holding a candle to they way they were during Guus Hiddinks tenure. Any chance we could nick Guus from Russia if they fail to qualify? COME BACK GUUS!!!!!!!!!
To be fair, I reckon Pim is capable of playing decent football, we looked real good when we came up against Ireland just a few months ago, particularly our passing and going up forward. Methinks when we play more direct we can get something out of the match i.e. Ireland, what was frustrating with us against Oranje was the fact we didn't play more direct when the opportunity presented itself, only instance was Carney bursting through at the end of the first half and Emmo on the right. Also seems we get into a lot of trouble when teams press on us when we're deep in our own half like what the Dutch did in the second half and hence their clear domination over us. That is something we definitely need to work on as well
Not stressing, just embarrassed to see Klaas garbage Huntelaar be part of this fine Dutch team. If only he was born a few meters outside the border... in Belgium.
We may have been outplayed by a top team but that top team is yet to beat us in 3 games. In reality this was only a warm up and get-to-know-you game for the ACQ Oman game. No one was going to go out there and flog themselves. It's a bit disappointing that we tend to play negative type football at home but we were up against quality and i suppose the positive is that we kept the Dutch scoreless for the first time in 26 games. Not bad. Bring on the Omani's
I think you guys got good value out of this friendly in the sense that you will come up against teams that play like we did in the World Cup. You are one of the best attacking units in the world so teams will try (or have no option but to try) to be very organised in defence and hope to take advantage of a mistake or a quick counter atack to sneak a goal. Saturdays match will give you some good video to review and see how possibly things could have been done a bit differently. Drawn matches against teams of our ability may be very costly to you in the World Cup, whereas a similar result for us would be vital to our chances of progressing. I think Kewell's comments on the match (posted elsewhere in this thread) sum things up from our perspective. A good defensive effort but lots of improvement required if we want to take another step up the ladder.
I was at the game - I thought the Dutch players did a much better job of not being muscled off the ball than they did in our previous encounters. To me that is a fairly big positive for Oranje, as matching it physically was the main challenge of this game for them. Aside from that, pretty boring. I was happy with the composure of some of our younger defenders like Kisnorbo, and our inability to cohesively build play based on moderate possession was again highlighted. It seems we require either overwhelming possession, or opportunities to hit on the counter in order to score. Creating is not our forte; our core of versatile midfielders is a blessing and a curse. We need a playmaker. Overall, an uninspiring match. The result in and of itself says little about either side.
It was a pretty lacklustre game all in all. We were well organised defensively but ridiculously toothless in attack. We took no risks moving the ball forward and just didn't have the same endeavour that we usually have. Its been pointed out in here but we really lack a playmaker in our team. It's blindingly obvious. I think the biggest positives were the performances of Kisnorbo and Vidosic. Kisnorbo looked really composed in defence and seems to be the best back-up CB that we have - although i'd love to see Williams tried in this position. Vidosic looked really dangerous to me, he showed a real willingness to make something of the game. I think he deserves every opportunity to make the strikers role his own before the WC. I'm a bit concerned about the performances of Moore, Culina, Carney and Holman. Moore and Culina are really slowing, I think the fact they are playing in the A-League shows a bit, they are not at their best. Carney is ok depth at LB but we really need to get Chippers in there as soon as possible. Holman just can't finish - his endeavour is first rate but his passing, vision, finishing aren't up to it. We have better options in midfield. Personally i'd prefer to see Carle play ahead of Holman just because he is more creative - although i'd have Bresciano ahead of both. Ned Zelic made a good comment on TWG suggesting we play Kewell centrally where he can be our playmaker. He is easily our best player technically and it would be great to have our play chanelled through him. I think at the least it would be a good idea to trial him in this position before the WC.
I'm not sure Kewell has the ability to orchestrate play from the middle of the pitch. He's always been great at making things happen, but he's never really been much of a provider for other players. He also needs service, generally when he can catch the opposition on the back foot and make use of his speed and skill to pass them. I don't really think getting balls at halfway and then having to turn them into a cohesive attacking play by utilising the players around him is his thing. It's a massive departure from any role he's performed in any team at any time in his career. Would love to be proved wrong though.
I think you may have been if Bresciano was there. I do think Kewell is better more central but closer to goal. Playing him where Verbeek played him for most of the match was ridiculous. It just cut him out of the game. The minute he brought him into a more central role and we started getting more effective down the right through Emerton, we started getting shots in. In fact in the end, had've someone moved forward to assist Holman we could've pinched it. We were off during the match. I thought we were much better in Eindhoven. It was a lot more like the match in Rotterdam. On the Dutch, they are an excellent passing team, and very good at keeping possession, but I think at times they can be a bit toothless up front. I'm sure Robben and van Persie would make a difference but Robben and van Persie were playing last time against us. They get a lot of shots in due to their possession, but often the shots end up going all over the place. As I said earlier, I don't really think Schwarzer was tested much at all. For that reason, I'm always reasonably confident of a win against them or at least holding them out, friendly or not. I stand by what I said before the match. They're an excellent team, but they're not unbeatable. Cahill was pissed off after the match, and frankly I also don't understand why he was taken off so early. And Kennedy should've been brought on late in the game not at the start. It was good to get some game time into Kewell and Neill. They were both rusty and it showed, but they got better. There's been a lot of talk about how we were lethargic and looking a bit disinterested, and I guess we were, but some of the managing with positioning and substitutions was a bit weird too I must admit.
Say we need a playmaker but if you're no Zidane, playing a defensive 4-5-1 with two DMF, you're not going to get much out of the creativity department. If Verbeek just plays one DMF then that could hinder our defensive capabilities for our attack when quite frankly there are question marks over it. So why fix when something ain't broken? I guess Verbeek knows that losing one DMF for another mid to go forward will damage the team overall. Verbeek is just getting the best out of his hand and quite rightly so he's doing an alright job of it. But as per usual, us fans want more, much more
Very few teams around the world would dominate possession against Holland. It's what their game is and has often been built around. But you still have to be able to penetrate a defence. Otherwise all that possession is for nothing. Having a sound defence is just as important. Italy proved that in 2006. Anyway, I just thought he could've set the team up a bit more creatively. He did in Eindhoven and we won. It was one of the more lacklustre performances I've seen from us for some time, hence why most people are saying the game was putting people to sleep.
Are you sure there's nothing broken? We consistently struggle to score, that's undeniable. I'm not saying we need a Zidane, but Grella is not getting the job done from a building point of view. It sucks to be relying on quick counters to score - I mean, we had periods of quite decent possession against the Dutch, but we did nothing with it.
Because we had nothing up front. Cahill and Kennedy went off at half time and we had Kewell out of position for most of the match. Add a fit Kewell, Emerton and Bresciano to that team and there would've been a remarkable turnaround. I also don't get the criticism of Kennedy. He scores almost all of the time for Australia and any player with his aerial ability is a threat against any team. I really don't understand why he was taken off so early. With him and Cahill, that's what I was getting at about bizarre tactics.
I'd argue that, ECE. This is a friendly after all and while I'd love to come of it and say "Yeah, we beat the Dutch again", I'm more interested in our players' welfare for a more important match that's just around the corner. Any word on Vinny G?
Oh I totally agree- I agreed with what he did- although I'm not sure if NRF does Grella's looking really doubtful.
