Ajax fans always had a problem with Afellay. Him and Van Persie are the most hated players. Afellay was bringing the tiki taka to Holland in 2010-2011, even Sneijder-VDV were giving him many times the key to create. Van Marwijk was a big fan of him as well, he wanted to build something around him. He is no option anymore for me considering his age, but still better than anything an Ajax midfielder would bring nowadays. It's always funny when Ajax fans want to reduce Afellay to a stubborn dribbler while he is obviously much more than that. He got a good range of pass and vision. Just that little penetration and pass at 00:38, it's not Klaassen that would do that, it is ? 01:58, nothing very special, but I can bet Wijnaldum wouldn't have the vision and ability to do this, Wijnaldum got no long passing at all. No wonder why Barca hasn't bought any dutch players for a while, most of them lack a good technical quality. Afellay wasn't good enough for the likes of Xavi, Iniesta, Messi, but he could be good player there without his injuries.
I don't hate Afellay, I just think he was overrated prior to the knee injury. He was never going to do much at Barca because of his limitations.
His only big limitations are his physical strenght and work off ball. With the ball he is a very complete player, speed, passing, shots, dribbles...
Well you also have to agree,his physic didn't help in either. He was always going to be a causality. I would rather prefer him more in 4-4-2 step up.
Alexender Butter is another player I reckon could be a great addition to NT, current frozen at Dynamo Moscow. He is a wild bull and never hesitates to put his body on line. I just hoping he gets out of that backstabbing club in Jan transfer window and finds a team where he can play regularly. This was his last goal he scored for the club. He just needs a good coach to work with.
Well if Ajax gets to play Bayern and if Dijks can contain Robben as how Buttner did in CL for Man United,then I will agree with your statement.
I think you are underrating Buttner. Without any offence your statement is typical of who imho watches a lot Ajax but not so much the other teams in the world and considers the Eredivisie a top league. Unfortunately the actual coach is not very different from you and that's this kind of mentality that made the Dutch NT so bad.
Buttner couldn't beat out Evra at ManU and really wasn't all that great when he was still in the Eredivisie. van Gaal who is an astute judge of talent (regardless of what one might think of his tactics) never gave a thought to calling him up for the WC. I don't have an Ajax bias when it comes to NT selections as I want to see the best players out on the pitch. If Willems ever gets healthy he is the LB, Buttner would have to show that he can play to that level which he has not yet done.
The thing that has hurt Dutch football the most, is the loss of a reliable offside trap due to the rules change of 2006. It was the cornerstone of our defense. Barcelona found a way to play a high line again with their possession football and now most Dutch coaches try to copy elements of that style, but it usually ends up in a toothless sideways game without penetration, speed or directness.
So Foppe de Haan is back in coaching .... I don't get that a guy who has won back to back U21 championships and a semi final at the Olympics and who has brought Heerenveen to where they are now is not favorited over a guy who has done nothing in club football and managed to do worse than Hiddink and broke a record by losing at home against Germany, no, ...... I mean Iceland. Now we have to throw away another cycle for the career of a guy who still has to learn so much? This is so stupid.
There should be a minimum requirement for the position of at least 5 years of experience as a club coach.
He did a decent job considering the circumstances, but Van Basten himself later admitted he wasn't ready for it.
We have 2 friendlies in November, Wales then Germany. Next year we have England and France. How many games are you willing to give Blind to prove himself? Keep in mind that this is friendly so results do not matter much. If KNVB has a plan change, I would expect they sack Blind now and let the new coach with new direction to rebuild now. However, it looks like the plan is to stay on course. Perhaps the earliest we will see change is after Germany game as KNVB is supporting Blind to march on. Some responsibilities are on the players, but I still believe we can find a disciplined, well structural coach for this group of player.
^^Unless there are mass resignations within the KNVB, Blind will continue irrespective of the results other than a 10-0 loss to Germany.
How about a 10-0 loss to Wales? I could see Bale absolutely destroying the team in its current structure.
Reasonable is fair analysis. His big mistake was not selecting Davids and Seedorf for 2006. In 2008 at Euro's Hiddink's Russia out coached him badly. He pressured the impressive Dutch midfield which forced Oranje defenders to bring the ball out of the back and pass the ball which was clearly not their strength. Hiddink of recent times of course sucked ass.
I don't think that not selecting Davids and Seedorf was a bad choice. It helped the team to construct itself for 2008 and 2010. It's what Holland should do now and stop selecting the 83/84 born players. + Seedorf always sucked with NT so I doin't think he would have changed anything. Davids instead of Cocu maybe. The biggest mistake Van Basten did in 2006 was to let Ruud on the bench against Portugal, Kuyt had a couple of chances but didn't convert any. Robben was bad that game, Miguel let him no chance. He should have subbed Robben at the half time and let Ruud to come in.
I cannot believe this type of thinking. The best players should always be in the selection, and to build for another future tournament is not acceptable. The Coach must pick the best players plain and simple that is my thought process. Seedorf was true World Class and got better with age as he was a key figure in the Milan sides especially in Champions League play. How they could use him as well. Although not always at his best for Oranje which probably had to due with being played in several roles over the years did not always suck that is ignorant. That said how Oranje could use a player of his ability now as well.
Selecting the best players is relative, football is a collective sport. Van Basten wanted to build a new team and he had excellent results during the qualifiers 2006 without Seedorf, who was total flop in the EC2004, especially the game against Portugal...He came back for the qualifiers 2008 and didn't bring anything neither. Would have Sneijder been so great in 2008 and so effective in 2010 if he didn't start in 2006 ? Not sure.
Not selecting Seedorf was one of the best things van Basten did. Kuyt and Seedorf were like polar opposites. Kuyt symbolized the new, fresh, hungry and humble culture that we so desperately needed. Seedorf stood for entitlement, blaze behavior, misplaced arrogance, wrong kind of leadership, wrong kind of energy, wrong everything. He was an important catalyst for a toxic climate that held the new generation back and held the NT back in a horrible way. I realize I am actually wrong now I write this down. Not selecting Seedorf was the single most brilliant thing van Basten did as the coach of the NT, not just one of the best things. He was indeed still a player that was hard to deny a selection in case we would have had a nobody as NT coach. Van Basten was not afraid for anybody in that time. Took on Derksen in his program like no other. Kind of roasted him. Took on Cruyff when he was coach of Ajax. Made this call. The call to not select Seedorf actually means that van Basten understood perfectly what was going on and what needed to be done in order to move on forward. I am grateful for that. 2014 actually proofs how important the team aspect is in football. 2 years later and we can not even qualify from a weak group where 3 advance to the Euro. From third of the world to that. The group process is something that can not be overstated if it comes to importance and Seedorf was one gigantic toxic element back then in this process.
Team Football as you say has/had nothing to do with Qualifying for Euro 2016. Its down to poor performance from Hiidink/Blind and very poor play plain and simple. Regarding Seedorf's non-inclusion at World Cup 2006 I remember Scolari of Portugal saying he was quite pleased when facing Dutch without Seedorf and Davids who had massive experience and were world class players. He also commented on his relief that Van Basten kept Van Nistelrooy on the bench, and played Vennegoor of Hesselink. Really? Why? So lost was Marco as Manager he was clearly unable to deal with big personalities.