Van Ginkel will be back in the Eredivisie in 2 years time. Wasted potential.. Like many. While Maher did implode.. He imploded at the right time at the right club. (but I still don't have a lot of faith in Maher)
I am a huge believer in van Ginkel. I think he is the future of the Dutch NT and is the solution for this 1985-1989 gap that exists in our squad. We will lack leadership and professionalism soon and he has that from birth. Very responsible and has Kuyt like mentality almost. I don't read Mou's actions as lack of faith in him. He saw van Ginkel at the U21 Euro and wanted him. Maybe he was overly cautious and conservative, but he did pen down van Ginkel on the CL list and not Essien IIRC. Van Ginkel also played vs Basel. I just think van Ginkel was not good enough yet for Chelsea. His passing from deep is nothing to write home about. Pretty uninteresting. The mistake in using van Ginkel was that he barely could make charges to the front (his strength) as Ramires and Lampard used every opportunity to move up so that van Ginkel was forced to sit back and watch "the shop". Then, if he got the ball, nothing happened as he is certainly no Pirlo or even Clasie. He played to his weaknesses a bit and so he never lifted off. Van Ginkel is a Mou player, just not sure he must want that. If he had a free choice then he would have gone to Ajax. He is also a victim in this story. I never thought he would be so stupid to go to Chelsea but that happened and then the injury. His recovery has been really fast and at U21 he did not do bad at the end of this season. Bit rusty still. Van Ginkel was much younger when he moved from Eredivisie. Afellay moved later I think and when he came in an injury carousel he never had a real foreign career. Van Ginkel with some wise choices can still become a very good player. I hope he looked at de Bruyne and considers a switch to Bundesliga. I think that is a good league for van Ginkel. Actually I heard Wolfsburg wanted him, so who knows.
Wolfsburg supposedly big 15M odd and he would have played next to Gustavo with Gustavo doing all the dirty work and putting the defensive shift for him with De Bruyne and Perisic would have played ahead of him. Schalke and Dortmund are stacked and I don't trust Leverkusen the looser club. There's not too many clubs which can afford 12-15M fee, decent wages and can qualify to play CHL Football which is a must for player development. There is no use going to a club not in the Top 6/7 IMO. Maybe Gladback or Wolfsburg are the only club which can do the same. Ajax would have been perfect and a dream scenario. Going to Chelsea under Mourinho was way too soon for his age. I hope he did not make the mistake as Ola John. He is essentially in almost the same boat as Ake when he had a break-out season with Vitesse
I agree we shouldn't look only at the results. I was just saying that reaching the quarter-final in 2014 would be good (the goal of the FA, the semi-final, looked way unrealistic beforehand - btw, why does the FA do this? Don't they want to win trophies? 'Well, semi-final is what we want.'). I hope that regardless of the result, the FA will still take their planned review seriously. http://www.volkskrant.nl/vk/nl/2698...zorgen-over-niveau-Eredivisie-en-Oranje.dhtml I saw Belgium yesterday; I noticed how many of that team can play a proper cross-pass. Kompany, De Bruyne and even the "technically limited" Alderweireld had a few good diagonal cross-passes (I say technically limited because it has been said very often that he ain't as good as Vertonghen or other CBs). How many of the Netherlands can play good cross passes? Wijnaldum? I don't think he can. De Vrij has tried a few times this tourney but is 'unlucky' so far. Cross passes are hard to do, esp. because it involves risk. Bad cross passes mean the opposition can puncture you immediately. De Bruyne is a dude who can both play football and work hard and doesn't tire. He was tireless. Netherlands should also ask where the proper strikers are when Van Persie retires. Belgium might not have a world class striker, but Origi can play football as well as some of their alternatives (not Lukaku). Btw, I'm not jealous... If Netherlands cannot win Belgium is 2nd best but I think Netherlands should be able to produce those talents too, and become a front-runner in education again...
David Winner writer of Brilliant Orange mentions in an interview for New Republic that there is a narrative in the English speaking media to portray the Netherlands as the villains this world cup. Would explain the extraordinary hostility shown towards Robben. http://www.newrepublic.com/article/118545/world-cup-2014-interview-david-winner-dutch-chances
^^I read the piece today as well. 2010 will always haunt us despite the fact that we did not play nearly as rough as Brazil did the other day against Columbia. I've given up responding to people who call us a thuggish team because of that final match since it's an argument that will never be won.
The games before the final were not thuggish. Even the final was a fairly even affair regarding both team's thuggery. But we lost.
Yes, but everyone remembers de Jong's kick out in the beginning of the match and forgets that he settled down and hardly had any infractions called the rest of the way. van Bommel was clearly a different case, lots of fouling by him.
It talks about the USA specifically. Maybe a strange thought but USA has a huge Hispanic population, as well as some considerable European demographic (18% has close German ancestry). The motive is there to not be too harsh on a few of the country names. It will not help to tie eyeballs, create interest, and important sponsors/companies as well. Meanwhile, it is in human nature and sports journalism to search for villains. It makes a good story and recurring theme. A country like the Netherlands or Uruguay, without too much weight, fills this need perfectly. I'm truly sorry if I say something stupid now.
De Jong only made 8 fouls in 7 games. That's actually not a lot for a defensive midfielder. Sad how one tournament has destroyed a perception. Meanwhile, other 'joyful football' nations have played 'dull' for 30 years.
http://nos.nl/wk2014/artikel/672003-pfaff-schandalig-gedrag-van-krul.html Pot, kettle. Didn't he see the other shoot-outs and violations of the code?
The KNVB boss (football association boss) said that "FIFA appeared against us" in the game against Costa Rica and no one of the FIFA, not a single person, congratulated him with the victory. http://www.voetbalzone.nl/doc.asp?uid=219054 If true, the refusal to congratulate is very strange.
So, who wants to play a attacking 433 game if we are to make the final? Didn't seem to work out too well for brazil?
Unlike Brazil's players, ours are tactically aware of where they need to be on the pitch and don't run around with no clue like Marcello (who was just disastrous).
Can't say that Marcelo, even with his awful game, is a worse player than Blind/Kuyt... Not true. David Luiz/Dante. Yeah I would take those two over Vlaar/de Vrij any day. Simply stated, the quality over those Brazilian players is definitely higher than the Dutch defenders.
Robben and deVrij crack Castrol top 10 ranking: http://www.fifa.com/worldcup/statistics/castrol-index/ranking.html Seems like eredivisie is producing lots of good defenders for some reason, now we just have to produce forwards to replace Robben, vPersie and Sneijder
^^If Oscar is in the top 10, I don't put much credibility in this. He was really not very good; nor was David Luiz EDIT: Wesley Sneijder at 18, WTF??? van Persie and Cillessen were also in the top 30 and Neuer was only 20th
This is an interesting metric, esp. for the modern currently active players (not their vintage players which suffers from very limited data). http://www.goalimpact.com/2014/07/netherlands-vs-argentina-goalimpact-of.html Higher = better http://www.goalimpact.com/2014/06/top-50-football-players-june-2014.ht