The game looked ugly, but they won, so not much to complain about. Van der sar: He is still one of the best in the game. Was in good position a couple of times, made a couple of nice saves, and almost had an assist Kronkamp: I haven't really seen him play before. I think he did very well. He is good in the attack and solid defending. I like him so far. Boulahrouz: Looked pretty good. I dont recall any mistakes really. Mathijsen: Same as Bou. Gio: Good game. Didn't go forward as much as usual iirc. He almost scored a screamer and almost assisted Ruud. Don't remember him being beaten much at all either. Cocu: Don't remember much of him, which may be good. I dont recall him doing well offensively, but he brings experience and defense. Landzaat: Nothing spectacular, but I liked it. He helped link the ball to the offense and got in there defensively. Van Bommel: Similar to Denny iirc. Robben: Hope it isn't serious. Kuijt: Really good game imo. He was dangerous many times. I also like that he isn't just a pure winger. Babel: What a debut! Not only did he not look out of place, he looked to be better than most out there. Good at holding the ball, can make some passes, not scared to take on players, BEATS players when taking them on, and he scored! He was reminding me of Farfan for Peru today. Just noticed he could use a lil work on his left foot. Ruud: Next to Babel, the player I most wanted to talk about. TAKE THIS MOTHERFVCKER OUT OF THERE! God damn do I think this guy is a waste on the pitch. I will give him the back heel that led to the second goal and maybe 2 other passes, but outside of the box this guy is a clown for Holland. He can't hold up the ball well enough, can't attack well on his own, and cant create well enough. anyway, these last 2 paragraphs are all i really wanted to comment on. with a healthy robben, hopefully a new #9, and hopefully 2 or so of the Ajax boys getting to top form, this team can achieve a lot me thinks.
Sorry to hear about Robben getting injured. Stupid by San Marco to play him. I want Bayern to win against Chelsea though, so I have mixed feelings about it. I don't really get what you say about RVN. Do you remember the goal he scored against Germany during Euro 2004? You might not have qualified from the group without this goal.
No need to act thatw ay towards Ruud, he needs to find his form and then he'll be sure to make us some goals. He put some pressure on the defense which is good. The best player was invisible today: -Cocu
It's a different situation for a striker though isn't it. And as we all know strikers often have a run of games off and come back strongly. Anyway what's your alternative, would you play Makaay up front on his own? I always thought RVN plus Makaay in a 4-4-2 should be explored more. Bloody Dutch system thinking. All in the best interest of Holland... being German I hope we beat you in the final in 2006. Not if we both keep playing like we did today though (are you Dutch actually?).
but when has he ever been in good form the national team? and yes makaay deserves a chance. if robben were healthy, i wouldnt mind robben-kuijt-babel either. if not either of those, put in p-air. still not working?, how bout jan ven-of-hess? kluivert should also be above ruud in the selection, ruud sucks. he is worthless. ps: no i am not dutch. grand-dad from surinam got me into them.
Kuijt works very hard but just misses that last final quality pass in his game, he gave the ball away to the opponent more than any other player. He needs to settle down a bit more. Overall every one did what they were supposed to do, Ruud did just fine, his game is in the 6 yard box today the delivery to him was just not sharp. Robben though? is this guy injury prone or what? Let's not count on him to be there too often.
But the game of the #9 in this tactic is not the 6yd box. As for Robben, lets not forget VDV 2 years ago when it looked like his injuries may be the end of him, he has gone a long time now without any really.
Agreed, Ruud should have dropped to midfield more, collect the ball. He did it some times, but not often enough. you see we played a defensive minded (or defense bound by tactic, cause Landzaat actually is anything but defensive minded) central midfielder yesterday, leaving vast amounts of space between him and the striker. Van Basten played it smart yesterday. he played a 4-3-3, so nobody would whine about not using wingers and us not playing according to the Dutch system. However, our midfield wasn't 'Dutch' at all. It was the PSV Eindhoven style of midfield. withouth a '10'. We'll play one against Armenia, mark my works but it worked like a charm, didn't it
It worked great. I finally watched the game late last night, and I was very impressed. I don't know if I've ever seen Holland play like that. It wasn't particularly pretty, but fantastically effective. I don't mind if every away game in the entire qualifying campaign is played like that (well, we'll have to go for it more against Armenia and Andorra). Landzaat was probably my MOTM, he was everywhere, while the team as a whole never looked stretched, and pretty much never lost their shape. Holland has never really looked competent defensively, and while that wasn't exactly Brazil yesterday it's great to see a Dutch team play strongly within themselves like that. And there's so many other options than can be used too. Like Joep says, I'm positive they'll use a number 10 midweek and give the attack a completely different feel.
I agree wit u on Ruud, but for most dutch he is their national teddybear. LOL So you can expect a lot of insulted dutchies He also kept Patrick Kluivert out of the dutch squad during EC so that makes him almost a national hero to most dutch. And Babel would show his full potential if only he was put as Centre striker! That guy is really something else, the new superstar. I also suggest you pay close attention on Maduro, next time he plays. He is seen here as the new Rijkaard. Really a superb midfielder potentially. PS im also of surinam decent btw
Sorry I'm a bit late with my post game comments as I was a bit busy the last 2 days. Wierd not to see comments on the game from Bluedaddy although he did the PbP. Anyways, I'm extremely delighted we got an away win on Romania, the only two games left that scare me a little are Finland(away) and Czech(away). If we beat Finland a draw with the Czechs would be sufficient to get us through given that we don't screw up the rest of the games. Let's get to the game, <defence> I was happy with the defense line for abosrbing the Romanian pressure. Apart from that superb header/volley chance(some of them argued the guy wasn't offside) they had in the second half nothing really troubled van der Saar. Gio had a good game, I have to say, and he's good coming forward but I still think the Romanians didn't ask the right questions on that side of our defence. My only problem with the defense was that they often reverted to the highball under pressure and that gave pocession away on most occasions. The midfield gets part of the blame for that as well. <midfield> Cocu and Landzaat worked really hard in midfield and to a lesser extent van Bommel who I was a bit dissappoointed with given the superb form he's in. I guess I could say the defensive coverage in midfield worked well. However, ball pocession wasn't good at all(especially in the second half)as the ball was either played long from the pressured defense or played along one side only and rushed to the wings. Notice that everytime the extra passing was made in midfield and the side of play shifted it resulted in an opening and a chance. <offence> I was happy with Babel's debut and thought it couldn't be better as he looked very lively out there and topped it all off with a goal. I agree he should start using his left foot more often but he played amazing for an 18 year old. Kuijt didn't have a good game although he worked very hard. He often didn't make best use of pocession, he might be more comfortable as a no.9 but he had some good games as a wing in the past. Although I was against having him start due to his recent bad form, I have to dissagree with most fo the people in this thread and say Ruud had a good game. I didn't see a lot wrong with anything he did. He pressured defenders, distributed well on most occasions and looked dangerous in the area as he came very close to scoring twice(header in the first and shot rebounded to Kuijt in the second.) As for Robben, all I can say is he's unfortunate. There are people blaming van Basten for this in the Chelsea boards, I say **************** as the strain he got has nothing to do with the bones he broke in his ankle. I think playing him for one half was very appropriate. We might need van der Vaart or Sneijder to step up to the plate on Wednesday, I noticed Holland has done much better in the second match dates of the WCQ in the past as they had more time to train I guess. Should be an easy game.
Anyone else notice Marco called in Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink for Robben? http://skysports.planetfootball.com...=25&title=Jan+gets+Dutch+call&channel=Holland
Yeah, I think it may be worth a shot throwing him in the mix at home this week. Ruud hasn't exactly been setting the world on fire (not like he's been getting the best of service anyways)
I hope people finally wake up and realise that this is the New Holland, where team spirit rules. It doesn't look as pretty as it used to but it's a lot more effective, and everybody fights to get a result. As a paying supporter I'm well pleased, this is what we've been crying out for for over a decade now. No more egos, it's The Fighting Dutch! Anyway to those saying Ruud had a bad game: what are you on about? To me he proved exactly why he deserves to be our no. 1 striker. The Holland striker is about a lot more than scoring goals, after all. The people who won it for us were our midfield players though, I can't recall having ever seen our midfield work that hard.
I agree that this is a new Holland as the team has been in the state of rebuilding since Euro2004, maybe a year before that. However, this doesn't mean that Holland cannot play beautiful football anymore. We have a very exciting group of players in both U21 and NT levels who are showing high team spirits. Who knows, this group might develop to be better than the last generation.
Of course, the football will probably get better. But what Van Basten has achieved is that there now is a group of players all willing to work hard for a result. We can now hold on to a 1-0 lead without problems, and I don't know about you but whenever we scored an early goal in the past I was always pretty certain that when we did we would also concede a goal at some stage. That has now changed - they're no longer afraid to drop back largely thanks to the tactical discipline of players such as as Cocu, Bommel, Ruud and Landzaat which is much greater than that of players like Davids, Kluivert and Seedorf.
Yes, the team has been more disciplined lately, especially this year. However, I would not say that the team lacked discipline during the coaching eras of Guus Hiddink and Frank Rijkaard which stretch till the year 2000. Things weren't the same when van Gaal took over and then Advocaat. With regards to discipline of individual players I disagree with Cocu and Davids. Yes, Cocu may be one of the most tactical players in the world. However, he has always been part of the team since 96 so he cannot be part of the "change" you're mentioning. Throughout his entire career, Davids has been one of the most disciplined players in the world on the field. He has always been a fighter for Holland and he pocesses more technical and passing abilities than both Landzaat and van Bommel. I would like to see him get back to form and lead Holland in the 2006 WorldCup even if that means he moves out of Inter.
I found your analysis quite interesting, but why did you have put in this line? These 2 players are in absolutely terrible form. I was surprised that vBasten had even selected them, considering his strict selection policy. A vdVaart and Sneijder in current form add nothing positive to the Dutch squad now. Besides, weren't you satisfied with the performance of Bommel, Cocu and Landzaat. Of course, they played quite defending but they were only following vBasten's instruction, im sure. Esspecially vBommel has good attacking skills, so I expect him to play more the opponents half today. We don't need Sneijder now and we certainly do not need an overweight vdVaart
Sure, but that doesn't mean people can't criticise him because he missed 2 top notch opportunities. His primary task is scoring goals. And to be honest, that's the only quality he has. If Ruud van Nistelrooij does not score, he is useless. Ask Alex Ferguson I personally prefer Roy Makaay on that spot, so NOT as a winger
Cocu has been the most consistent player for Holland over the past 10 years, and Davids has also always performed for us. But to say Davids is technically more gifted than Landzaat and Bommel is, frankly, a bit silly. I would agree with you that there will be times that Holland need Davids, but not for his technical ability. All Holland players know how to handle the ball, they all have good basic technique. The special thing Davids has to offer to this side is experience. Anyway can I ask you if you regularly see Dutch league games? I don't think that anyone who does would classify Landzaat and Bommel's technical skills and passing abilities as substandard.
I would prefer Makaay against weaker opposition, but in a game vs Romania where everybody has to work hard and even strikers have to help out defending, I'd much prefer Ruud, even if his form is a bit off. Ruud works a lot harder than Makaay.
I do realize both players aren't having the form of their lives especially Sneijder as van der Vaart hasn't been all that bad in his last few games for Ajax. I wasn't satisfied with Holland's build up for large spells of the Romania game especially the second half and I mostly blame the midfield for that. The midfield was working great covering when Holland lost pocession but during build up the defence line was often isolated and so were the wings. Having a more attack minded player or a "true" no.10 might help in ball distribution and slower build up. Armenia aren't expected to have the same attacking firepower as Romania so I don't think such a move would be bite us in defence.