Netherlands laboured to a 3-1 win in Belarus on Saturday in a result which all but ends their chances of finishing second and reaching the World Cup playoffs.
- Follow Football-Oranje on Twitter
Sweden’s 8-0 win over Luxembourg earlier on Saturday left Netherlands needing to put at least seven or eight past Belarus if they were to keep their slim chances of finishing second alive.
A fast start was needed, but instead, Netherlands were sluggish in the opening twenty minutes, creating absolutely nothing. Vincent Janssen sparked Oranje into some life with a strike that came crashing down off the crossbar. Minutes later, Arjen Robben cut back for Davy Propper to net the opening goal.
Netherlands could have been further ahead at the break but several chances were wasted, with Ryan Babel, in particular, guilty of messing up in front of the Belarus goal.
No changes were made at half time but Netherlands started the second half well with Janssen testing the Belarus goalkeeper with a shot on the turn while the striker also headed just wide.
Belarus weathered the short storm at the start of the second half and began to threaten themselves. Eventually, left-back Maksim Volodko got in behind the Netherlands defence and squeezed a shot past Cillessen for the equaliser.
Bas Dost and Memphis Depay were thrown on shortly after the equaliser, but neither made an immediate impact as Netherlands struggled to string passes together, let alone regain the lead. It seemed that Netherlands were heading for a draw and an exit before Tuesday’s final encounter, but Dost then won a penalty, which Arjen Robben netted to make it 2-1.
Belarus missed three great chances to equalise before Memphis sealed a 3-1 win with a curled free kick in injury time.
Netherlands now need to beat Sweden by seven goals on Tuesday to take second place in the group. It appears that Netherlands can forget about reaching Russia.
Follow
Follow @Footballoranje_ on Twitter
it is a shame after seeing bergkamp,davids,stam,sedorf,de boer,van nistelrooy,kluivert,overmars,robben,sneidjer and all the dutch players all over the years and then see this losers wearing the dutch t-shirts plays with no hope with no tactics no spirit literally this is the worst generation of dutch football i have ever seen .. when you see the 33 years old man play with all his energy and those youth cant do a single play during the match and play with no energy then you will realise the difference between the generations
Biggest problem has been player selection. You can’t play guys that don’t even start. And then change every game. Blind was in way over his head and he was the architect of this 3 year debacle and this should have been fixed. The one thing I gathered from the Dutch is their lack of desire, nobody sweats. They have become too soft and their commitment to winning looks like its not there. If anything I would say since the last WC we have been one word and one word only. LAZY!!!! I’m not upset the fact is they have gotten what they deserve. My biggest concern is not having the players but having the right coaches in demanding a winning attitude and commitment which is GONE at every level. Holland has become a third world country in football and its happened in a blink of an eye. I hope they can turn it around for the next Euro campaign but not being in the WC will see them drop at least another 10 spots in the FIFA rankings in a year. Many thanks and it isn’t the end of the world so to the future guys keep a chin up do your best and that’s all as supporters we can ask.
As qualification was pretty much out of their hands before kickoff, i’ll focus thoughts on the match itself.
– Defensively, both full backs were poor. Blind provided none of the quality from the left he supplied in the last match, and it was his cheap giveaway that caused the move that led to the Belarus goal. Janmaat showed no fluidity with Robben and was constantly out of position, including on the goal. VVD had some good interceptions and was solid in the air too. Belarus could have gotten 2 more without him.
– Wijnaldum continues to struggle. Shows zero awareness while in possession of the ball, dallies and gives it away frequently. Incapable of winning the ball back for his side, either. Propper is an improvement over Klaassen or an aged Sneijder in the no 10 role.
– Janssen worked hard as always, but continues to go wanting in finishing. Same for Babel, who could have gotten 2 goals in the first half alone.
People can blame coaching and tactics but that’s only a small part of the problem. The bigger problem is the quality in the side. It isn’t great and it will get worse once Robben retires (which seems imminent). Very lean years seem to be ahead.
I’ve never done a post-mortem before mathematical elimination before, but there’s an exception to every rule. It’s easy for us to sit in front of our televisions and behind our keyboards and accuse players of not caring, not trying, etc. All players wearing orange want to do better than they have since beating Brazil for 3rd place in 2014. Obviously today’s match, like many others since then, looked like my aforementioned accusation examples, so I understand why people say them. After all, perception is reality.
Now is not the time to single out individuals or look for quick fixes. Coaching changes are attempts at a quick fix. We need to address the root of the problem. In my opinion, the root of our problem is both with our coaching (always going to the old boys club) and a stubborn attitude that we must play “typical Dutch” football.
It is time to blow the entire program up and start focusing more on developing our youth. We need our youth national teams to win before our mens team can win. Germany did a complete reset after 1998 and look at them now. To a lesser extent, the Belgians did the same thing when they missed every tournament from EURO 2004 until WC2014. It’s our turn now. If there is one mental flaw we have, is that we are obsessed with playing a certain style of the game. The only exception to this obsession was 2014 when Louis van Gaal changed the formation and it worked despite nothing but criticism from home. He was the only “old boys club” coach who has the ability to adapt his philosophy to the game and the way it is played today. Coaches like Blind, Hiddink and Advocaat obviously don’t have that ability. I don’t think I’m ready for a foreign coach, but maybe raising that possibility will encourage more Dutch coaches to realize that the game is not the same as it was 20 years go and “typical Dutch” football doesn’t work anymore without our starting eleven being stars on the world stage.
That’s all I have for now. All I want Tuesday is for the players on the pitch to forget about the math, forget about the fact we won’t be in Russia show some pride and passion. Play for your spot when the next competitive matches come around. It also might be Arjen Robben’s last match in oranje and every player owes it to him to make it a good one.
To cheer anyone up old enough Rob Rensenbrink autobiography just out hope they publish it in English!
A couple more points I want to make after sleeping it off, one just hit me in the face watching DEU-AZE…
I just watched Goretzka use his heel to put the ball into the top corner of the net from a broken play off a corner. We don’t have players who have the sense to do something like that. Some in oranje would try perhaps, but it would go horribly wrong. To have that sense and skill to make such an improvisation work, and actually score the goal, is a quality that I just don’t see in our players coming into the system anymore.
FIFA tiebreakers. It is easy for an Oranje supporter to complain about this today, but I firmly believe it is a legitimate point whether we beat Sweden or not. Goal differential to separate two teams as the first tiebreaker is an embarrassment to the sport. If we do beat Sweden Tuesday, our two matches against Sweden will be to our advantage (a win and a draw), yet unless our win is by 7 goals, having that better record against Sweden will not matter. The purpose of playing sport is to win and in this system, running up scores against minnows like San Marino helps you more than beating the teams you’re competing with at the top.
If this was a Euro qualifier, all we would need to do is beat Sweden and we would be here looking forward to supporting Oranje as hard as we can Tuesday. Instead, because of goal differential being FIFA’s measure on who is the better team, our captain is begging supporters to show up and we’re on our keyboards expressing our opinions on what the KNVB needs to do. Even though there are legit issues and there are big problems needing to be addressed, we should still get second place whether a win Tuesday is 1-0 or 7-0.
I’ll use that point as a segway to my last point, which is the negativity our supporters display. I’m not saying don’t complain, don’t be critical or anything like that. Honest criticism is what good supporters do and I know there’s plenty of it appropriate for our national team. With that said, when I see a comment like “it’s better to be a San Marino fan than Holland”, I can only roll my eyes. If we win Tuesday, in theory (and in UEFA’s mentality), we will the second best team in the difficult group we had when our team is in its current state. That has to be seen as a positive in the sense that if the KNVB addresses the problems correctly, we are not that far from being a great national team already.
More than anything, we just need a new attitude and play to our strengths under a system designed for the players we have at our disposal, rather than 4-3-3 possession football with players who are afraid to attack. Teas like Northern Ireland, Iceland and Wales don’t have more talent than we do (not counting Gareth Bale of course), yet their national teams know how to play with each other and that gives them their confidence, which gets them results. Problem number one for the KNVB, start prioritizing getting a result over how your style of play looks.