This can be a friendly, a qualifier, Euro or WC. I am curious when you thought a player had painted a van Gogh with a certain game he played. I should kick off, but the creation of this thread also has another reason. I find this question hard to answer myself. Really hard. Some random games that pop up with me (I am mixing here all kinds of games with each other, also against minnows): Sneijder against Denmark was very good. Sneijder against San Marino delivered magical passes. Van Basten against England in 1988. Kluivert against Yugoslavia in 2000 Robben against England in a friendly recently 2012 Davids had brilliant games and Rijkaard as well. We can go with magical goals, as van Basten and Bergkamp did, but where their overall performances in the whole game also great? Would like to hear from people what they think is the greatest individual performance they have seen in Orange in a single game. You can of course also make top 5 rankings. Cheers
Cruijff against Argentina 1974 Cruijff against Bulgaria 1974 Rensenbrink against Iran 1978 Gullit vs Denmark 1984 Gullit vs Poland 1987 Bergkamp vs Italy 1992 Bergkamp vs several matches against Brazil except the 1998WC one Honourable mention for Rijkaard against West-Germany in 1990.
hahahaha. Vs my team Italy in 2000. Classic defensive performance by Italy playing with 10 men from the 30th minute onwards in holland to win. You guys were coming off the performance of your lives vs Yugoslavia. You still should have won that game though and had so many chances to do it. 2 penalties not converted? lol just not your day. For me, Kluivert was the best ive seen from a dutch player in the yugoslavia game in 2000.
Yes, that game was tremendous, in Rotterdam during Euro 2000. I remember hearing some downbeat jokes from some fans in Amsterdam about the upcoming semifinal against your Azzuri, to be played at the Arena in Amsterdam. Back in 2000 and earlier the Arena had a certain bad vibe to a few mainly Ajax supporters. As a club, the team were riding a very poor patch of results for a few years and the atmosphere was one of the reasons why it was disliked by many supporters (nowadays the Arena has reversed this reputation since then..). It's a long-winded way for me to imply that some believe the Arena brought bad luck, lol. And you saw what happened.....
Some random thoughts: Netherlands - Germany, Euro 92 : Bergamp's rise alongside Gullit & v Basten. If I'm not mistaken, it was the only tournament these three ever played together, plus Bryan Roy. Legendary stuff....but you know how Orange legends seems to end up... Netherlands - Italy, Euro 08 Netherlands - France, Euro 08 Possibly the two finest matches of recent years, technically & tactically. v Nistelrooy was sublime, and so were the rest of the players. And people get all giddy about today's Spain. BLAH ! These two matches were of the highest quality, for any national teams. Netherlands - Argentina, WC 74 Netherlands - Uruguay, WC 74. Watching these matches is like going into a time machine, where football was just so different back then. But yet still, when quality meets brute, often the brutish (and dirty) prevails. Not this Oranje. It was for good reasons that this side is arguably the greatest ever side, that rivals that of Brasil 1970, Hungary 1954 and others. Cruyff and company really looked light years ahead of the competition. It was football from another planet, from another time...
yep was going to mention that game from 2008. Holland were awesome in the group stage, so beautiful to watch. Did us a favour by beating romania also
This is the first time in all my years on Bigsoccer that an Italian mentions this. It's great you noticed this vital detail of the Euro 2008 tournament, especially considering one extra point and that is we lost Robben in that Romania match who got injured again. There were 4 main reasons we lost to Russia in 2008, but one of the most important IMO was the missing of a player that could counter punch the Russian with their mad pressure. Spain actually was able to punish Russia's attacking style as they were vulnerable at the back. It was really a case of getting through that pressure of them. However we simply lacked a player that could do that for us in the game. Only a Robben kind of player could have tilted the outcome of the event IMO. On a side note that Romania squad is maybe one of the more underrated ones of the past decade: Finished above us in the qualification for Euro 2008. Drawing and winning against us in the direct confrontations. Not only that, but I felt that they borderline outplayed us as well at home, having a lot of possession, looking good on ball. At the Euro 2008: Draws against France and Italy. Not sure how they did against Italy, but I did not feel France were much better than Romania when I watched the game. Bit of a boring equal match IMO. Romania 2008 was a very good organised team that maybe deserve a bit more respect from the international comunity. I remember what the Czeck did for Netherlands in 2004 and that's also the reason why I hope they will rise again. They fought like lions against the Germans and as a result we advanced to the knock out stages. Nedved is still one of my all time favourite players. Also stayed loyal to Juve when they went to Serie B. I respect that, certainly in these mercenary times. I wished the Czech had won Euro 2004. 2008 was great for the Netherlands, many will say better than 2010, despite being knocked out much earlier.
Good calls. Though what players jumped out to you in the games you mention? I think Davids in 1998 (probably the Argentina game) was pretty damn good as well.
I will admit to being a Juve fan! It was interesting to see which payers sucked it up and stayed with the team when they could have requested transfers: Buffon, Del Piero, Marchisio, Nedved and a couple of others. Then you had Cannavaro and Zlatan who bailed on the club right away.
I'd say, for the Germany match in Euro 92 it had to be Bergkamp. IIRC ( it was a long time ago..) he played at centre forward and wing, switching with v Basten often. Gullit at no 10. Bryan Roy would come in as a sub. But going by memory andwithout looking at match details, I'd say Bergkamp left a lasting impression on me at that match and that tournament in Sweden. We really should have won that, but as you all know, the Germany match was 'the' final match. After that, Oranje were already in cruise control mode, which was why they lost - mental ineptness again.... At Euro 08 tournament, the entire team really gelled together. Swift and fluid and esoteric in all aspects. However,to pick out one player, I would have to say it was Sneijner. He redeemed himself mightily after the letdown of WC Germany 06. His passes were sublime, off-ball movements were intelligient and he established himself as the mega superstar in midfield, ousting vd Vaart from the no 10 position from here onwards. Remember his passes to v Nistelrooy? His distribution to split opponents? These matches are must-have for anyone who wants to own a collection of classic international matches... And in W.Germany WC74, who else but the Oracle himself. Against Argentina & Uruguay, Cruyff demonstrated to the world his visionary approach to the game. His weighted passes really tore up opponents' defences, also with his deep running. In short, Cruyff's vision of football approach completely opened up megatons of spaces for his team-mates, and enabled Oranje's superior technical skills to be demonstrated mercilessly. To be fair, it can be argued that Cruyff seemed to have sometimes lost small laspes of concentration in and out of the match, but this cannot be used against him due largely in part because as a team, Oranje were so dominating that opponents were completely overwhelmed. And that allowed plenty of 'down times' for Oranje players. But also equally important to note that each time the opponent threatened to take control - the very few times they occured - Cruyff & Co always managed to up their tempo and retake control of the ball distribution. Cruyff's goal against Argentina was one of my favourites.
....in thinking back to all those Oranje matches I've seen that really impressed me, rarely has there been one player, or one moment of brilliance, that really stood out as game winners. Some non-Oranje great international matches I remember are: - Argentina v Brasil at WC90. Brasil were hot favourites, and Argentina were limping and slow(ish). Brasil seemingly dominated 90% of play, but in one moment of brilliance, that ONE magical pass from Maradona to Cannigia, broke the hearts of 180 million Brasilian fans.... - France v Brasil, WC06. Another vintage Brasil side, versus a good French side. But in this match, Brasilian tactics made a critical omission: they gave Zidane too much space. As a result, Zidane rejuvenated his game and played quite possibly his greatest match since France '98. He single-handedly tore favourites Brasi apart. - There are a few more, such as Rossi for Italy at Spain '82, Roger Milla for Cameroon at Italia '90 etc. Meanwhile, most Dutch national team matches are won collectively. All these matches I mentioned in previous posts, plus plenty more that I'm trying to recollect, have been a result of high quality team performances. But there is one individual single performance that really sticks out. The most famous is obviously that-incredible-Frank de Boer -pass - to- Bergkamp....! The pass that brought us into the semis of WC98. We should also analyze Jong Oranje's truimphs at Uefa's U21's in 06 & 07.
So that's what was missing against Russia. I forgot he didn't play that game. That was a huge loss the injury hurt you's bad. That Romanian team was pretty good they gave us a run for our money. We just couldn't score that game though we had so many chances and Toni gave us the lead on half time but it was wrongly ruled out for offside. Romania had their chances too hitting the bar from a free kick. Yeah the France-Romania game was a boring affair. France were really disappointing at Euro 2008 I thought they were going to go far. Holland were great at 2008. In fact the group stage form they displayed was the best I've ever seen.
Sneijder vs Scotland in the 2nd leg of the Euro 2004 playoff qualifier won by Oranje 6-1. Granted Scotland are/were terrible but great performance - remember his turn and run at midfield for the 1st or 2nd goal?
Robben vs Spain 2014 world cup was a beauty! Go Holland! Dutch teams of 98, 2000 and 2008 were awesome!
- Robben vs Germany in 2005 - Kluivert against Serbia at the Euro 2000 - Quincy Abeyie playing for Netherlands U20 against Japan. - Edgard Davids vs Argentine in '98.