I have a child, I don´t drink when Mr Neeskens isn´t here unless I have a babysitter! Speak for yourself!
It´s all over, four nill to us. We only need one point from the remaining four games and we were brilliant at times in this game. Bring on South Africa! Bloed zweet en tranen but no tears tonight!
Great team performance. Not a single bad performance that comes to mind. What can you say. Theres no need really to do player ratings when i think everyone performed well. I would have liked to have seen a little more from van der wiel though, but thats nit-picking. Great to see van der vaart score .. he really needed that.
But I'm gonna do them anyways You sick bastard, he made one mistake, other than that he played great, you filthy 020'er!!
The Van Marwijk strategy obviously works in that respect, they´re all hungry to perform, even the bench warmers. I still don´t get how Gio gets to start mind.
Just a great game. It was Macadonie, but that is not the point. It was the over my dead body mentality, the pressure, the fighting that did it for me. Nice vd Vaart goal, really smart. Everybody deserves a thumbs up for this one, and the screamer from Afellay became almost true with the last shot of the mach. I want more from this dish!
Much as we´re always bitching about our defenders and goalkeepers, today we matched our historical clean sheet record in qualifying, dating as far back as 1969.
Did you guys see how Afellay absolutely destroyed opposition for the few minutes he was on...wow! This team has so much depth it is scary...seriously....it might be the best team in the world. i said it.
I´m still not convinced that we can do it against quality opposition across an entire international tournament but the potential is definitely there!
Oranje marks out of 10: Stek 7 : Did well, although was never really challenged Gio 8: revival in the leftback spot, cant applaud him enough!! Mathijsen 8.5: He looks like a geek, acts like a geek, but plays very well. If he can keep it up, he IMO should start for Oranje in WC2010 Ooijer 8: One of our better defenders, similar to what he did in Euro, countless interceptions, I hope he keeps present form and represents Oranje in 2010 Van der Wiel 8: Yes against weak opposition, still held his own, defended well, and came forward even better. Cant ask for more (although he did make some key mistakes). VanBommel 9: best defensive midfielder we had!! De Jong 8 : 2nd Best DM we had, slight off-game for him I thought Robben 7: not his best game, but not his worst either Sneijder 8.5 Started most of the midfield traffic, he's our key to WC2010 glory Kuijt 7: I have to give a 7 cause he scored 2 goals, but his ball-loss (bal-verlies) in midfield was atrocious Huntelaar 8: I have to give him an 8, constantly dangerous, knocked in an important goal, yet couldve scored more. Our greatest striker for the future!!
Midfield and attack that is, yes. It is really packed with good players. To beat Brazil, Argentina, Spain we need better defense. The reason we have clean sheet after clean sheet is not the ability of defenders to defend well man to man. It is the defensive midfield organization with v Bommel and Nigel. They are functioning as a filter, a very good filter. Gio is such a weak link when we come under pressure. Today it was that free header, against the scots the free opportunity from that striker. The Gio problem must be solved. Imagine Messi against Gio. I mean, that is a good title for a horror movie.
Needless to say I agree. Thing is we do have better options than Gio for the left back position. Van Marwijk just isnt willing to try them in serious games. Now that we´ve virtually qualified, perhaps he might.
V Bommel was not playing today as a pure defensive midfielder. he had interception after interception, but was way more active than normaly in the attacking area of the field. If you have seen the team, maybe the biggest joker is not player a, b or c, but that the players realize they can be left on the bench like that. vd Vaart comes in for a great Wesley, and scores a brilliant goal. Affelay had 2 great rushes and wanted to show everything in that last 10 minutes. He was not thinking, oh pfff, 10 minutes, whats that. he was doing his atmost best to give reason to give him more minutes to play, or even to keep him in the selection. When you saw the beautiful atack by Wesley to Babel, you realize how importent a Huntelaar is. He would have made a goal out of that situation.
The Oranje looked good today, but with an opponent like Macedonia, it's hard to judge too much. Great to see Gio back in good form and van Bommel as well for that matter. Loved seeing Sneijder controlling the play going forward. It was bitter sweet to see the 4th goal go in. Great to see van der Vaart get a goal, but I had money on the Dutch winning 3-0
2 things id like to say. 1. Stop saying our defense is bad. In the past year...how many goals have we given up...4? Seriously, 1 goal in 5 games this campaign, and it was a penalty...we have solid defense. Done. 2. Gio starts not just because he is good, but because he is the captain and gives us an element of experience that would otherwise be lacking. Most of the team is still yuong, except for Van Bommel, Oijer and Gio. Out of those 3, Gio is the one with the ability to coach players on the field and lead by example.
Fantastic Oranje Today! The energy levels by everyone was top notch. Always great to see that attacking football. Van Bommel more active today as well. Very impressive performance by the Bayern Munich Captain. Sneijder is the playmaker end of any discussions on that subject! Great goals by all today. Linesman must learn that even is on! Babel got hosed there in the 2nd Half.
Come on people, anyone can see that Gio is past it. Yes he can still play a bit of football an looks pretty good going forward, but is that enough for a left back? Against both Scotland and Macedonia, it was Matthijsen and sometimes even Robben who did the dirty defensive work in that area of the pitch! Besides the world cup is over a year away. That means that next summer Gio is over a year older. We need to bring flesh blood in now. Considering that we've virtually qualified, now is the time to do it. I have to say I liked Matthijsen a lot yesterday. About our other three defenders on the night, I'm not so sure how they'll hold up against quality opposition. I hope Van Marwijk gives other players a chance for the remainder of this campaign.
What? Be glad he doesn't! I had enough Theo Janssen's and Van den Bergh players in the Dutch NT. In the future Braafheid can be used as leftback, or Wilfred Bouma if he's fit. But so far I prefer Gio on that position, well, till Bouma is fit. Vd. Wiel - Heitinga - Mathijssen - Bouma Not that bad, although it might lack some tall defenders . But who knows, maybe Van Eijden can fill that spot in the far future. He does remind me to Jaap Stam around 1994. But even Jaap Stam was quite average at the WC in 1998. So I predict he will need a lot more years to be solid enough for a NT spot. But I really don't understand why Van Eijden isn't selected for the Netherlands B while Pieters is. But that's an other story.