NED 2 -1 MEX FT

Van Persie is a skillfull player too… but why still in the offense we lack these skills… It was a shame when Kuyyt and Babel missed that opporunity when they were both alone against the keeper (sanchez)…
I think have a good team work, but no skills…
by the way, nice jerseys for the dutch team today, but i still prefer the ORANJE…..lol

Posted from  Lebanon

@Jezza

I would add Landzaat and de Cler to the list of rubbish ones. What the hell were they doing?!

I think your lineup is right. But, I think we’ll still have to see Kew Jaliens before deciding on the right back.

Hope van der Vaart gets some playing time on Sunday. (Although Sneider did a pretty good job)

we have very good starting eleven(the ones that played against cameroon) added to them we have kuyt and sneijder and thats it. the rest are bad. i really liked kuyt in the second half he was the nest player on the pitch.
we have a big problem in midfield, lack of quality so lets pray to have van der vaart back because he is our only saver in the midfield.
the team in the first half today was baddddddddddddddddd.

I thought Babel did pretty well. The left is probably not his best side.

Heitinga had a mixed bag. He defended well, came up in the attack and scored the goal.

But also lost the coverage on Borgetti which allowed him to score

Btw.. Did you guys notice that little block manuever Mexico used in the first goal? It was a bit like a basketball block. Heitinga was covering Borgetti then he moves forward to meet the ball and at the same time another mexican player moves right in front of heitinga blocking him from staying with his man. Perfect.

They used that move twice. (I wonder if they should have saved that for their first group game.

I was really a little dissapointed with Kuyt. You could tell he gave a big effort. But two of those chances he should have put away. Period.

Also, that stekelenburg save in the second half was excellent.

@daniel
you’re right about the basket ball thing, i said to myself it is really like a basketball play.
yes,stekelenburg did well on that shot.
but, i disagree with you about kuyt i think he did well on the right wing.

@Jezza
Great post :-)! Horseface eh? Hahaha…

I think we shouldn’t take these games to serious, other than for v Basten to see things they trained on and such. I mean, playing friendlies is different. The guys have trained hard, haven’t played often in this mix, and they all hold back a bit, I’d say. Except for Kuyt, who doesn’t know how to. Don’t be to harsh on Landzaat, he is a terrific player normally.

my line up:
Sar, Gio, cocu, ooijer, kromkamp, vaart, sneijder, bommel, robben, Van, Persie

If van Persie and Sneijder don’t play, vd Vaart most certainly will, and he will take care of set pieces.

Posted from  Australia

@jan
you’re the man, i think this is the line up i would like to see. to have quality in midfield van basten should put sneijder and vdv together, added to robben, vns and van persie we’re going to kick some ass:)

You’re right alaa, Kuyt definitely did improve once he moved to the right side.

I like the idea of pulling Cocu back, they need his experience back there.

btw, Van Basten said today that playing van der Vaart on Sunday would probably not be sensible.

(doesn’t mean he won’t have some crack about not always being sensible on Sunday..)

vd Vaart has got to get some playing time in.. No game in two months now?

@daniel
yes man, i am really worried about this guy, do you know what we’re missing. we’re missing too many wondeful things he did in hamburg, he was phenomenal the first part of the season. we need him.
but where did you read about this?

I think that is a good result for our B-team. I dont think Babel was impressive but Heitinga’s header was superb ! We also have to admit that Borgetti’s header was exceptional. Kujt did not amaze me, Van Persie was on form and Sneijder is set to be the new dennis Bergkamp. Anyways Mexico was good in defense in the first half I wonder what happened to them.

Posted from  Lebanon

In midfield - van bommel, sneijder and VDV cannot go together.. one of them should be a defensive midfielder, like cocu or landzaat or maduro.

So one of the latter three along with sneijder and Van der Vaart, and we’ll be just fine.

I think last game was a good game all in all. But its true, many players did not perform well at all.
Babel; Hesselink were bad..
de cler; landzaat; heitinga gave a really 100% effort but that did not turn out to be good enough.
Maduro; Boulahrouz were ok. I think they can give better. I pesonally prefer boulahrouz to ooijer. But that is of course debatable.

Kuyt and Sneijder. were very good. Especially Sneijder. He really proved his worth last night. Kuyt had a lot of energy around the ball and was therefore able to dominate.

Starting lineup:
Back: kromkamp; mathijsen (or ooijer); boulahrouz; Gio
Midfield: VDV; cocu; Sneijder
Forward: Robben; VN; VP (Kuyt).

I think theres one interesting problem the dutch should face in the coming few days.. Because of the lack of experience and confidence up midfield and defence positions, the weaker players tend to give the ball directly to the stronger players (VP; robben) and let THEM do all of the job of creating chances. This what mainly hapenend with cameroon. Last night Sneijer did not have this option. He was forced to take and create the chances himself and he was able to perform well. However, the same cannot be said for most of the other weaker players. Most of them don’t have enough experience; and some of them even lack the adequate talent.

PS: how many Lebanese or ppl living in Lebanon are there here?? All AUB too i suppose ??

Posted from  Russian Federation

Daniel and Alaa, you sound as though you watched the game. How did you manage that, here in Australia. Can you let me know please

Posted from  Australia

@Rami
I have seen Sneijder play on the no. 4 position (in Ajax terms) many times, the defensive midfielder position. He is very good at that, although he must restrain himself a bit. But, he can do it. Bommel on the other hand, has his impressive runs into the box and his goalscoring qualities (and his forgetfulness in defensive terms, to say it nicely). All in all, that midfield can work…

Posted from  Australia

After Reading this blog, i felt most of you here are way to harsh on the dutch players. Be happy that we won with our B team. How would you feel if we lost 3-0? And i think almost everyone here forgets that, This whole team that Van Basten put forward, was one of the most inexperienced. Mexico are a good side, and winning against them is a good sign. Jezza, Rami, Daniel. You critisize players way to much. I watched that match yesterday, and everyone tried to play there role, which is not always easy when playing an experienced team like mexico. Some players could indeed improve, and the only way to make that happen is to let them play, let them make mistakes, and correct there mistakes the next time they play. How on earth are you going to support Holland if you only critisize them? This is a whole new generation of players, most from small european clubs like ajax and feyenoord or AZ, almost none of whom have experienced a world cup before! Dont forget, the team that played tonight is not the team for the world cup, and i would like to congratulate our B team on there well earned win. Cheers

Posted from  Oman

@ Jan: good starting eleven, but Cocu as a full-back? I think not. His tackling is far too reckless.

@ Martijn: I agree, let’s give Heitinga, Maduro et al a chance to improve and let them play - in Jong Oranje. They’ve got potential, but they’re young players with a fair bit of learning still to do, and this is neither the place nor the time to do it. Remember Vlaar?

@ Daniel: I didn’t include Landzaat and De Cler in my name-them-and-shame-them list, as they’re usually quite good. I’m inclined to see their performance as a one-off. With the others I’m not so sure.

Posted from  United Kingdom

i fink you guys are piling too much praise on van persie! i admit he is an extremly skiful player. but from a arsenal fans point of view he doesnt score enough goals. Every game last season wen he started for arsenal they would only score maybe one goal or none. He is very good on the ball and is a pleasure to watch but no way would i put him in instead of kuyt, van persie hasnt scored for about 15 competitive games. kuyt is a special player who knows wat to do with the ball and he scores regulary. give kuyt his chance to impress this is his world cup i can see it! van persie will have his chance in the next world cups!

Posted from  United Kingdom

A very good performance from the B- Squad of Holland, it is good to have players on the bench knowing they can perform well under pressure.

Some good performances by Kuyt ( mainly 2nd half ), Babel was involved alot ( missed a chance for open goal though ).
Sneijder did great, brilliant freekick and save from the Mexican keeper.

My prefered line up would have to be:

VD Sar, Van Bronkhorst, Ooijer, Boulahrouz, Heitinga, VD Vaart, Cocu, Van Bommel, Robben, Van Nistelrooy, Van Persie

subs: Sneijder for Van Bommel, Kuyt for Van persie and Mathijssen for Boulahrouz.

Posted from  Netherlands

@lars

good point…i agree with you that van persie lacks a bit of finishing in front of goal whereas kuijt is a proven scorer, but the real decision for MvB is does he want a better supply line for RvN (van persie) or someone to ease the goal scoring burden from RvN (kuijt)? personally, i’m torn but either way we’ll see a great player on the right wing. HUP HOLLAND!

Posted from  Canada

@Jan
i think a technically gifted played like snieder would do very well in defensive position especially with 3 men in centre of midfield. The distribution of the ball will be very efficient. seen iniesta there, impressive. but then there would be a need for two very strong centre backs (cocu & ??), which netherlands does not have….
i think cocu must play in midfield to provide some cover up for a fragile defense and more attacking options for the sidebacks…

@rudy
yes man, i watched the game on the latino packag. (dishnetwork).

Posted from  United States

@Rudy

I watched the game via a french tv channel that was broadcast via a Sopcast feed. (Goto http://www.sopcast.com)

And since my french isn’t that great I tuned into the dutch radio show ‘Langs de Lijn’ for the commentary (www.omroep.nl) at the same time..

Honestly, the sopcast thing is a pain the ass. The feeds vary in quality quite a bit.. (but they are free)

For Sunday’s game I’ll go with http://www.knvb.nl/live again.. (thurs game was not available in US due to restrictions)

Posted from  United States

@Martijn

Hey, sorry, I don’t mean to critize too much, man.

You’re right, our B Team won from Mexico. And considering that they haven’t played together like this too much before, it was a good performance.

Here, I’ll sing with you:
ORANJE BOVEN, ORANJE BOVEN!
OLE! OLE! OLE!

I still think landzaat played like shit, though..

Posted from  United States

@Jezza
No no, Cocu as central defender who can move onto midfield. Gio is left fullback, Kromkamp right. Most opponents will play with one or two strikers. So why use 4 defenders… That was my point…

Posted from  Australia

@Daniel
thanks Daniel. I will go with knvb. just finished watching the mexico game. This is great service.

Posted from  Australia

Yeah, thats probably the only thing i could agree on with you Daniel. But hey, shit happens. Im curious about the starting line-up against Australia. we’ll see! and as far as im concerned, lets keep the singing for the match itself, when it is on :D. HOLLAAND!

Posted from  Oman