wow . that last 5 minutes was scary stuff ... we kinda just fell asleep ... thank god we have van der sar back there ..... other than that it was a solid game by the oranje ..... that score was not even close to what it should have been .... i cant count the number of blown chances .... realisitically it should have been 5 or 6 nul... i thought kuyt played well when we came on .. and i dont think anyone played a particularly poor game ... just a lot of blown chances
It's disgrace that a team like The Netherlands can score only 1 goal and even gives the nr.150! of the fifa worldranking changes to make 1-1 Yes, they qualified But don't tell me they played good. I almost fell asleep terrible match
1-0 Full Time. Thumbs up for Lux' goalie, massive barrier! It wasn't kinda scoreline I was imagining playing against a minnow at home, but I am satisfied with the overall performance. Ball possesions and distributions were good, chances were created (a dozen of attempts on goal according to official stats), I definitely think there is a legit reason to be optimistic about this new formation, if Marco decides to keep it. The biggest difference I noticed from the regular 4-3-3 is that, instead of long passes to striker or wingers, there is now seemingly a bridge or outlet in midfield (Seedorf, Sneijder, and Raffie) for the defender (Bouma, Joris, and de Zeeuw) to deliver the ball. The whole attack rests on the creativity of the midfielders, and we all know there is no shortage of it. The two agrresive full backs (Bouma and Melchiot) covered the flanks very well. Besides, everybody played on their natural positions and they looked much lively. With fully fit Ruud and van Persie, finishing couldn't be much easier. Against a stronger opponent, either Gio or Demy has to be sacrificed to allow Heitinga or Ooijer slide in to partner Joris. I'd say keep the same idea for two or three more matches ahead, and see how the lads gelling.
First half was good, 2nd half a sleeping pill Oh well we qualify Torrent here: http://www.mininova.org/tor/1000107
Not happy with the scoreline and how can you be, but the consensus seems to be happy with the quality of football. Plus looking at the match stats Oranje dominated, no suprise. There are no easy games and it never helps Oranje that most of their opponents play negative or defensively. This is the case and has been the case for most of the past 20 plus years. Speed of play is crucial for Oranje always. The talent and ability is there as always, and I hope it blooms come tournament time. At least VB has made some changes, but who knows football can be weird. Its just really strange that under VB Holland do not score much. Match ratings please? Amstel, Neeskens, your thoughts?
Nothing except the inability to find the back of the net. Holland had two thirds of the possession time, 29 shots (14 on goal) to two for Lux. It was a typical match where the opponents dropped all ten field players back into the defense and didn't once threaten until the last five minutes of the game. Thanks to van der Sar, the one goal stood up. I don't think we can fault van Basten for this one. He played the formation that everyone has been calling for. I think we will do better next June when we face teams that are not so defensive minded and there will be more openings. Watching Spain yesterday, it would be fun to see the Orange play against them. We could see goals galore!
I give everyone a 7 except for Melchiot who looked drama out there. MOTM for me is that Lux keeper, if it wasnt for him it wouldve been 2 or 3-0 But this team has to get better, if we play a big country at Euro we're gonna get creamed. At least Marco is open to 4-4-2 now, I give him credit for listening to his players
I thought it was a fairly decent game allround, I liked how Kuyt played (no reference to our discussion last week!). I'd give the team a 6. These games always are utterly forgettable anyway. The minnows have worked out a way of sticking 10 men in the penalty box, with a bit of luck a goal is scored in the first 10 minutes and you get a monster score, if not it's 90 minutes of pouncing on the minnows' goal. Hardly surprising either that you get the odd counter attack against you when you literally play on the opponents half. Kudos to Luxembourg, it seems above all that the minnows are much fitter than they used to be. But if I were UEFA I'd have the Luxembourgs of this world play a pre-qualifying tournament, these games are SO pointless.
I'm leaving for amsterdam tomorrow ... any advice on were to watch the match on Wednesday? Last summer I caught the opening matches of the WC at the skye sports cafe in leidseplein before heading to leipzig for the group opener vs S&M ...
I agree with you Neeskens. Uefa and FIFA need to think about an alternative plan regarding these qualifiers.
we didnt do bad vs. luxembourg created plenty of chances,just couldnt find the net we always struggle against teams like this who got 430654 people defending we gonna do better against bigger teams on the EC like we always do cuz then both teams are gonna be playing actual football,and then we'll have more space to do our thing+by then i hope van basten created a starting 11(cant believe him,he has been switching and changing up shit,and hasnt formed a started 11 in 3 years!)
I dont think its possible to play poor and not get chances against luxemburg. we have too much talent. the problem is that its 11 players play on pure skill with no set tactic. if you watched carefully most of the work done was just blind crosses from the defenders into the box. if we would take the time to make quality chances. ie. spreading the game out, not rushing anything and drawing the defenders out, we would be creating more. the one time sneijder took it out to the wing we scored. just for fun, i looked up the last time we actually beat a legitimate "powerhouse" and it was 2003 against argentina (1-0) so this rumour of us always playing well against the big teams is false, sadly.
Looks like Koef will start again. Probable lineup: -----------------------------Stekelenburg------------------------------ Melchiot------------- Heitinga---------- Mathijsen------------------Bouma Van der Vaart------------------- De Zeeuw-------------------Bronckhorst Babel--------------------------Koevermans-------------------------Kuijt
I am curious to see how bad/well the partnership of Joris and Heitinga work. Both have been playing some great football for their respective clubs, and this is arguably the best Marco can offer. Barring injuries or losing form, I think Bouma is dead set for left back.
We were in a difficult world cup qualifying group and in a difficult 2004 world cup group though. I don't think anyone expected us not to lose a game in either, but we didn't. Also, one thing's got to be said in Van Basten's favour: we're less likely than ever to drop points against sub-standard opposition.
Are the Dutch media focusing at all on the prospect of the Oranje lying down in this one? Odds on a Holland win have drifted to 2.1 on Betfair amidst rumours that the Dutch won't be trying in order to avoid the penalty of being top seeds at Euro 2008. (It's a penalty because Austria and Switzerland are in two of the top four seeding positions, and they're teams that others would like to come up against, whereas the likes of England and the Czech Republic are set to be in Pot 2.)
We've discussed this pretty extensively on the Dutch board. Difficult group, easy group, most of us aren't really bothered either way. As for Van Basten, he says that he prefers to be no. 1 seed, as it means you're based at one location, play in one stadium, and don't have to move from one base camp to the next. I know there's a story in the German Bild paper where they're making allegations about Holland not wanting to win this game. I can sort of imagine that they're worried as Holland has never failed to get out of the group stage of an international tournament. It's all speculation though, I don't believe any of it. A lot of our regulars are injured (Sneijder, Robben, Van Persie, Van Nistelrooy, Van der Sar), their replacements will want to prove themselves to the manager.