“Bad for my heart”, says Foppe

Promoting himself from coach to director, one could almost say. He walked dozens of meters to the spot to confer with the ref. In his own Heerenveen, Foppe defied the rules to point out that his opponent was breaking them.

“I had to react. The rules were broken. Other than that, there was nothing wrong. I didn’t get a yellow card and Stuart Pearce agreed with me. And yeah, his players took it out on me, but I don’t care. I don’t speak English anyway…” Foppe said, with a wink after his abyssmal English was ridiculed in the media.

England tried to prevent Taylor – injured – from having to take the spot-kick.

De Haan: “They said he was too injured. Well, in that case, he shouldn’t have been on the pitch at all.

Ryan Donk was the Dutch player who didn’t need to take a penalty. England ended the match with ten, so Holland could bench one player. Foppe: “I actually wanted to bench Kruiswijk, but Ryan came up to me and said he really didn’t want to take one. He missed one against Ajax in the National Cupfiinal and was too nervous.”

Kruiswijk missed his penalty. “I know Arnold isn’t the best guy to put on the spot with all that pressure. I wanted Boy Waterman to take it, but I couldn’t reach him in all that mayhem.”

De Haan was surprised that Drenthe missed his first penalty. “That was a surprise indeed, he always scores from eleven meter. I was so glad for him that he scored his second one.”

De team manager kept the faith even until the end. “Although we were behind 0-1, I felt as if we couldn’t lose. I am so happy, but it’s not good for my heart. I need to tell the players this for our next match. This is the second time in a row we are in the finals. And in our own country as well. We mustn’t let this slip away.”

De Haan wasn’t content with the execution of the play. “Our pace was too low. The crosses weren’t good enough and our strikers were too static. And with that England goal our defense played as amateurs. I think the players put too much pressure on themselves for this match.”

Maceo Rigters was declared the man of the match, after his spectacular overhead kick.

Roy Beerens was happy with his two successful penalty kicks. “I figured the keeper kept track of which corner the players took. So I decided to place the ball in the other corner the second time. That was good practice. It was a thriller of a game, but I do feel the best team won.”