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42 hours of flying for 90 minutes of friendly football

October 6th, 2009 | By: Jan | 15 Comments »

Martin Jol didn’t need extra time to ponder the question. What did the Ajax coach think of Oranje’s trip Down Under. Jol: “I don’t like it at all!”.

And the look on his face was as if he smelled something really bad. But his voice was relaxed. Jol knows that protesting won’t work. He mumbled something about commerce and medical responsibilities and all, but the moral of the story is: the Oranje Ajax players (De Zeeuw and Stekelenburg) will come back in a week completely “buggered”, to use an Aussie expression.

And that applies to all other Oranje players as well. In seven days, the Oranje selection will fly through all time-zones available to men. The first leg is the trip to Hong Kong: 11 hours and 25 minutes.

There’s an hour and a half to make the second leg: another nine hours to fly to Sydney. The arrival time is 9 in the evening, but the body thinks it’s noon. The internationals will have a light meal and go straight to bed.

Which won’t be easy, with the European day rhythm in head and body. The next day, Van Marwijk planned two training sessions. Three days later, the game is on Saturday and on Sunday it’s back home. The trip back is longer than the trip into Australia.

The group will land on Monday morning early, with a long day of jet lag ahead. It’s never done before in the history of international football: a 42 hour trip to play 90 minutes of friendly football.

It’s not for nothing that the Australian team – the Socceroos – play their friendlies in England. Not a lot of nations are prepared to travel to Australia. On top of that, most Aussie internationals play in Europe anyway and they prefer not to travel too. Australia played friendlies in London against South Africa, Denmark, Nigeria and Ghana.

The only other European team to fly Down Under was Greece. The only other national teams come from South America, which is “only” 14 hours away.

And our team manager might not like it either, these commercial expeditions. The only professionals eager to make the trip are the sports journalists who’d love to check out Sydney while on the job.

Bert van Marwijk had one condition: we will only play one game. The coach created goodwill with this compromise. He will use this trip to check how our lads will keep themselves in tiring circumstances. Van Marwijk doesn’t mind the trip. The world champion “klaverjassen” ( a popular Dutch card game) will be able to play lots of game, during the 42 hours in the air.

Tags: Ajax, De Zeeuw, Group C, Jol, Oranje, Socceroos, Van Marwijk

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Comments

By Firezen | October 6th, 2009 at 4:02 am

42 hours? What a bugger. Why can’t they fly directly to Australia? Planes still not enough fuel to do one way flights?

Posted from Australia

By Tiju | October 6th, 2009 at 6:22 am

Name MP MIN GOAL Yellowcard
Davide MENDES 1 10 0 0
Eljero ELIA 1 18 1 0
Edson BRAAFHEID 1 44 0 0
Khalid BOULAHRO 1 62 0 0
Michel VORM 1 90 0 0
Stijn SCHAARS 2 100 0 0
Ibrahim AFELLAY 5 113 0 0
Ryan BABEL 5 165 0 0
Dirk MARCELLIS 2 180 0 0
Edwin VAN DER S 2 180 0 0
Wesley SNEIJDER 5 202 0 0
Demy DE ZEEUW 3 256 0 0
Gregory VAN DER 3 270 0 0
John HEITINGA 3 270 1 0
Robin VAN PERS 6 425 1 2
Rafael VAN DER 7 438 2 1
Klaas HUNTELAAR 8 443 3 1
Nigel DE JONG 6 444 1 2
Maarten STEKELE 5 450 0 1
Arjen ROBBEN 6 458 1 1
Dirk KUYT 8 618 3 1
Mark VAN BOMMEL 7 630 2 0
Andre OOIJER 8 658 1 0
Giovanni VAN 8 676 0 0
Joris MATHIJSEN 8 720 1 0
Look at the stati of kuyt and hunter..

Posted from India

By sonneveld | October 6th, 2009 at 7:15 am

van bommel doesn’t have a single yellow?!

By Jan | October 6th, 2009 at 7:52 am

Oranje’s training sessions in Sydney will be held at the Sydney Showground in Homebush Bay. Initially they would train at the Sydney Oval in North Sydney but heavy rain ruined the pitch.

By susanne | October 6th, 2009 at 10:25 am

Hm. Everyone seems to be dropping out. Now Nigel de Jong joins the list of drop out for Australia. Robin van Persie, André Ooijer (we’ll miss him), Affelay, van der Wiel, van Bommel and Robben

Posted from Netherlands

By finnster01 | October 6th, 2009 at 12:35 pm

Who wants to fly 42 hours for a friendly? I am sure the club doctors are more than willing to help with some dodgy injury diagnoses…

By Michel-Olivier | October 6th, 2009 at 3:45 pm

this friendly was the best time to test lads like fer, brama, bakkal, vlaar, brouwers, wijnaldum and lens.

Posted from United States

By finnster01 | October 6th, 2009 at 5:34 pm

Lets be real. This friendly is just Henk Kesler cashing in on a return match in Holland.

Too bad the players will have to suffer the long trek. With so many guys out with “injuries”, the meaningfulness of this whole exercise (other than for Jan to have a great day out) is minimal in my book. No disrespect to Australia, which is a great and upcoming team, but this has KNVB written all over it and I am sure it includes a return match at some point played in Holland.

How about playing some good European team close by. It’s in the middle of the season, which is why so many has awful “injuries” all of a sudden? If I was BvM I would punch the teeth out of Henk Kesler at the earliest opportunity.

By Johonna | October 6th, 2009 at 7:51 pm

I cannot tell you how annoyed I am at this. Sneijder is just starting to settle in at Inter and now he has to fly to Australia? He will come back horribly jet-lagged and we have an important game on the 17th.

The whole thing just seems irresponsible.

Posted from United States

By Liam | October 6th, 2009 at 10:03 pm

Oh come on, the Australians always have to travel everywhere to play these games. Why can’t other countries? It is the lead up to the WC, the players need to start putting themselves under pressure anyway. Seems like some excuses are being made.

Posted from Australia

By finnster01 | October 6th, 2009 at 10:49 pm

@Liam: Maybe if you advertised cheap fake Rolex’es in Australia they would all come.

By Carlos | October 7th, 2009 at 12:38 am

Hey Guys – ALL other nations will STILL have to play on WEDNESDAY when our boys are back at their club for 2 days. Get serious OK, some of the South Americans will NOT get back to their club till Friday compared to our Dutch Boys ! Try and look outside the box .

Posted from Australia

By Johonna | October 7th, 2009 at 1:26 am

I would have no problem with Sneijder going to Australia if this game was a legitimate qualifier, but it isn’t.

I hate international friendlies.

Posted from United States

By Leon | October 7th, 2009 at 2:27 am

We have a score to settle with the Aussies as well. A draw and a loss against them! Dutch pride tells me this game means a little bit to Oranje. Off to catch my plane to Sydney now.

By youtube | October 7th, 2009 at 11:24 am

di dear,
Lets be real. This friendly is just Henk Kesler cashing in on a return match in Holland.
thanks

Comments are closed