Ronald Koeman is shocked by the performance of his Netherlands side in his first two games back as Oranje boss.
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After the 4-0 loss against France, Netherlands were wasteful in De Kuip and could only manage a 3-0 win over a 10-man Gibraltar side.
Speaking to NOS, Ronald Koeman reflected on his first week back in charge, “There is work to be done.
“Particularly in positional play, ball circulation, taking the right positions as a winger or back. That was not easy for me, we really need to improve on that.”
Koeman knows it’s not going to be easy to change his side, “Because you can’t work with the players for long. You don’t get them until three days before we play the Nations League semi-finals.”
Koeman even admitted he was shocked at the level shown so far, “It is clear that football has to be much better. We have to raise the level, we have to improve. I am quite shocked by moments in matches.”
Reflecting on the game against Gibraltar, Koeman concluded, “It’s not the best match to play anyway, because an opponent – logically – doesn’t cooperate. That’s difficult. But we haven’t scored enough goals. Right from the start I found it imprecise, sloppy. Then you know that it is waiting for the goal. It falls, then it got better, but we don’t have the form to create many more great opportunities. It was less than I had hoped.”
Koeman admitted it had been a difficult week due to the virus and player dropouts, “It was a difficult week in many ways, with dropouts, sick people. It has been constantly restless. Even during the match you can’t always make substitutions because the boys have been ill. Cody couldn’t play the whole game, Matthijs couldn’t, Memphis is out with an injury, Wieffer couldn’t play the whole game. It was very difficult to work even more focused. I have never had such a week in my previous spell as national coach. I hope I don’t have to experience that again.”
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KNVB has a huge problem on their hands: What NT manager walks out of a disappointment like this and blames his country’s heroes?
Koeman is not up to this. He was a great player, and he’s proving to be a stront manager.
I watched the Dutch vs Gibraltar last night had so many chances only converted three. Simons was awful. Gakpo kept cutting back on to his right foot on the left so unnatural. For me no Frenkie de Jong no efficiency. This group is now a battle between Rep of Ireland and the Nederland for second place.
It is not the problem of the players, trainer is the issue. Koeman is far far below van gaal. Same player pool, van gaal can bring us to wc quant-final. Only lost by penalty. Under koeman, I doubt they can through euro-qualifiers. As I said before, more and more disasters will come, we should get used to it. Knvb should remove koeman asap before he do more damages.