Quotes

Oh yea Kyle my big question over this whole damned match.. Why Hesselink in ?? and Van Nistelrooy out ??

Mike I’m going crazy about this. I don’t know what to think of Van Basten after this decision.. Enlighten us with info before i make my final decision over our coach and doom him.

Posted from  Russian Federation

Holland Just Flat out sucked. I was cheering for you but your dirty!!!!
After today you deserve to always loose.

forca Portugal (as they say)

Bad Bad Holland. Shame on you!!!!

Posted from  United States

after reading 100’s of posts about this game, I’m not going to add anymore than I already have except to share with everyone a story that I hope will put things in perspective. I should mention that I am a Portuguese fan but I have always been a fan of Dutch football. In fact when Portugal wasn’t in the WC, I always rooted for the Dutch (and Brazil of course) because of their positive football. Really, our styles are not that much different and one would think that there would be mutual respect between us. Anyhow my story…

I was lucky enough to have tickets for the Netherlands v Portugal game at the Euro. My friends thought it would be cool to hang out at a stupid mall instead of getting early to the game (long story, still makes me angry). We get to the stadium minutes before kick off. We need to find parking, and as we drive around we smoke some hash and then I tell them to let me out in front of the stadium because it wasn’t my damn fault they wanted to go shopping. So a bit stoned and rushed, I run into stadium by myself, walk to what I thought was our section. As I come out of stair well, I notice that the section I am about to enter is completely ORANGE! I should mention I am wearing the Portugal team jersey. Boy did I get nervous. To this point, all of our seats had been in pretty much neutral sections. So I walk up the steps to where I *think* my seats should be, but they seemed to be filled by Orange too. So being a bit paranoid from the hash, and with the game about to begin. I just decide to walk further up the steps and find some empty seats where I can gather my thoughts and see what is going on. I find a few seats near some young dutch fans. They acknowledge me and I say hello as well. I then ask them when the recieved their tickets. They informed that they just ordered them once the Dutch went through. I commented that most of my tickets have been in neutral sections and that I don’t know how I ended up here in the middle of all these dutch fans! The guys were very cool though, as they immediately put my somewhat foggy mind at ease. One guy tells me in English that it’s cool for me to sit there, if they win everything is cool and if Portugal win, it’s ok too. He thens says to me, ” IT’s NOT LIKE YOU ARE GERMAN!” I laugh and then I agree with him in a sign of mutual appreciation for both our countries and our football clubs. After all, IT’s NOT LIKE WE ARE GERMANS! Don’t forget that my Dutch freinds!

Best of luck in all your future competitions and continue to strive for Total Football!

-Tony O

Posted from  United States

What is next ?

Need wait for next four years?

Posted from  Taiwan

one big mistakes for van basten is he not bring huntelaar along with his squad. he have great winger, have great defence & goalkeeper but he don’t have great striker like huntelaar. RvN & Dirk Kuyt is simply useless because they don’t know what to do with the ball.

maybe van basten should change the tactics with 4-4-2 with two strikers.

Posted from  Indonesia

Cool story Tony, love that. I hate to see all those abuses and profanities on the blogs. It is just a GAME, for crying out loud!! If we played the game again, we could have won. Let’s get angry about poverty and hunger in the world. Or corruption. Or arms races. Or gluten. But this is just sports. If Cocu would’ve scored etc etc etc etc. It doesn’t count. But at least we know one thing… We don’t have any real problems, if we can get so distressed by 22 men (less when the game progressed ) chasing a ball…

Posted from  Australia

Let’s face it: terrible game by both sides. Lots of effort, compensating the absence of football. I don’t get why the dutch claim this moral superiority. They were the first going violent. Really violent and no red card. So don’t talk about partiality of the refs. They (the ref) were terrible to both sides and for the spetacle, no preferences here. But the dutch didn’t contribute, trying to make goals from the middle field, no ball touch, just strengh and waiting to be luck, well luck was not on their side. Portugal didn’t play much football but they were 1 guy less almost all the time so i think at least is more understandable. That’s what happend with the really bad teams even when they loose they behave in order to make you more assured they are just loosers.

@Tony, thanks my friend, kinda needed that story, to be honest youll never be my favoutite team but true:your not the germans..

Can anybody tell my why everybody is so critical of the game?? Thought is was the best match we played by far, true it was ugly sometimes but with both teams…

we were all very surprised Marco left Ruud on the bench, dont know why…

took today off at work, feel so very low at this moment, dont care about the WC anymore, very sad to see the people in the street pulling away the orange decoration (and its raining!!)

will this blog go on??? will you guys (alaa,micha,rami,mike etc) keep posting??

GVD

greetz

WIJ HOUDEN VAN ORANJE

Posted from  Netherlands

Van Basten : The best forward ever!!! Fantastic Goals, fantastisc movements!…

Today he lost, tomorrow will surely win…

“show must go on…”

Posted from  Portugal

Let’s face it…. We just did not play good enough to go through. No-one can expect with an output of 3 goals in 4 matches to advance. Scoring is still the name of the gamen! Perhaps a further maturing will give a different result in 2008 and 2010.

Posted from  Thailand

It was a very very interesting but unbelivable hard and ugly match.

It was the hardest match i can remember (from both sites) but the whole mess starts with the unbelivable foul at ronaldo in the 8th minute after that the match became mor eand more ugly.
At the end it was not possible to play football anymore.

Hey Goose my friend i guess we will not meet anymore in this tournament but i have my doubts that we will survive the next round so we had no chance to meet this year. Argentina Italy and brazil had always been our nighmares.

Posted from  Germany

i thought the match was terrible from the start and it got worse with the referee’s decisions but lets not hide from the facts that 2nd tackle on Ronaldo deserved a red card Van Basten messed up not putting Ruud on at start of 2nd half Portugal always looked more dangerous in attack, Tell me why the dutch always feel it neccesary to have infighting going on at big tournaments is it because the players think themselves better and more important than the team, and if you think figo faked the elbow into the face that did connect wot about the fall from figo’s headbutt both teams were as bad as each other trying to get opposition booked and the referee was weak but the dutch lost because of their coaches unwillingingness to put on the only recognised goalscorer they had(ruud)

Posted from  Ireland

yea i will.. it compensates for the frustration i have lol..

i guess we write a lot to let out.. I am sad too in many ways. I don’t think I’d like to watch the rest of the matches, as i simply dont care about anyone else except our team.

When u say we played good i think u refer mainly to our midfield. We have to acknowledge it was good.. sneijder and van bommel cocu to a certain extent did a fantastic job. We knew how to get the ball forward.

Somehow i understand Van Basten when he said after the game that last night’s events were beyond the experience of his team.

Bad refereeing, clever and devious tactics by portugal, and in my opinion some unclever substitutions on our part … and most importantly the timing of all of this really made the difference.

No doubt.. the ref last night was bad to us as much as he was bad to portugal. Unfortunately by the time he had lost control of the game in the 2nd half, Portugal were already one goal up. there was nothing easier for portugal to do, even a man down, than to defend and waste time and play absolutely negative football. On the other hand, inexperienced as we are, and unfocused and hyped up as we have become during the 2nd half because of all the turmoil that took place, there was very little chance for us to come back to the game and level things..

In the end, i guess we have to look ahead at 2008. In many ways, for me football season just ended today.. It starts again late this year with EC qualification fixtures

I’d like to know your opinions vis a vis Van Basten.. In my opinion, we saw the good and the bad from him. Not only are his players inexperienced but also is he..
What do you think ?

Posted from  Russian Federation

Don’t get me started… I’ll probably dedicate a separate post on the Good, the Bad and the Missing Substitution.

Furthermore, I sent a letter to Dutch prime minister Balkenende to cease all contacts with Russia (Ivanov) and Portugal. And to demand an answer from Van Basten: why not Ruud????

Posted from  Australia

in retrospect i’ll have to say that vanBasten made a few mistakes…

maybe Huntelaar but he had no international experience what so ever and Kuyt already had, Vennegoor is a different type of player alltogether so i can buy this not selecting of Huntelaar esp. since we all hoped vanNisterooy would be enough..

about midfield: i always backed vanBasten in his not selecting of Davids and Seedorf, i thought vanBommel would be our man and together with a fit Cocu would rule midfield in defence wich would give vanderVaart or Sneijder the possibility of doing something creative.. BUT vanBommel didnt play well at all and Cocu never looked realy fit so in retrospect?? im sure Davids alone would not be able to fuck up the atmosphere within the group but he sure would make his mark and thats why vanBasten didnt select him..

guess it always depent on how in-form your players are..

he sure did make a mistake with vanNistelrooy, telling the press before he told Ruud, here you can see inexperience..

the playing good part is just my impression, i learned through the years that im not able to look at a game when Holland play in a normal kinda way, i only recall impressions and my impression was that(esp.2 half)we played(or tried)dominant football on the Portugals half and that it was an open game..

im just so dissapointed, we waited 8 years for this and now its all over, im gutted, feel empty..GVD

greetz

WIJ HOUDEN VAN ORANJE

Posted from  Netherlands

In all cases, however, i give him a definite vote of confidence for him to stay as manager. He should be criticized, definitely and he in other hand should accept his criticism… He has a whole damn sour summer for him to reflect on what he did/not do/shouldn’t do…

But i think he should stay because.. changing coaches every 2 years is the worst strategy ever. I say we keep him till 2010 even.

I’m sure the team we have today we’ll look amazing in no time.

(thats one of the few positive and uncritical comments I’ve given in thie blog heh..)

Posted from  Russian Federation

@Rami, well amen to that then…

WELL BE BACK, MORE MATURE, FIGHTING, PRESSING, ATTACKING,

WELL BE BACK AND BEAT THEM ALL

greetzz

WIJ HOUDEN VAN ORANJE

Posted from  Netherlands

Great story Tony O. I hope more read it and we can all get past this game.

Rami - I mean no offense by this comment, but to criticize Scolari’s character suggests that you haven’t followed his career very closely. You won’t find a more upstanding individual in Football today. You can’t criticize him for defending his team, just as van Basten did.

Posted from  United States

No Luis.. I never talk about him as a portuguese coach.. And of course he has every right to defend the team he is coaching.. Obviously !!!
And please you could see on several occasions that I describe him as a powerful and strong coach.. But i just don’t like him man.. He irritates me. I dont like him at all actually hehe. Thats it. I respect him of course but you have to excuse me - I’m still gonna release my apathy towards him by calling him “a dog”.

Cheers man .. You’re not his relative or lawyer.. And I dont think hes even portuguese.. Actually hes born in Holland (Amsterdam)!! So don’t get too offended.

Posted from  Russian Federation

Did you guys watch Italy-Australia??????????????

What is this? I really feel like I’m watching a World Cup in which the referee makes the games, creates the wins and the losses…

Anyways the penalty is very debatable. Was watching with a big group of friends, none of us with Italy or Australia, we almost got into fight whether it is or is not. So i assume in the end that it’s kinda like a 50/50 call. Nevertheless, the ref made the decisive call that would hand Italy the very easy way out..

Lucky Italians.. Akh. Its luck my friends that is making the in this world cup, not good play, not superior play. Just sheer luck !!

Posted from  Russian Federation

@Rami, it was a dive, im sure..but there was real contact, its just stupid that the defender went down like that and invites the italian to collide(?) with him, im sure that if he wanted the italian could have avoided any contact.. cheaters!!!

Posted from  Netherlands

Hey Tony, as a Canadian who has many Dutch relatives, I loved your classy story. It rings so true, re Germans. The euro cup win in ‘88 was so sweet because , as my Dutch cousin said “we beat the Germans”.Your story puts a new light on my own personal attitude toward the Portugal team.

Posted from  Canada

Though the short run has been disappointing, I have to say I was glad to see the Dutch play some heart-wrenching football because here in the States, I don’t get to watch it much and get mocked when I talk about the WC. Those of you in other countries probably have no idea what we’re dealing with over here. I get a lot of flack from American guys who would rather watch obese baseball and American football players and constantly complain about how “there’s not enough scoring in soccer.”

I got interested in Dutch football back in 92 when my parents and I moved to Badhoevedorp while my mother attended university in Amsterdam. Anyway, long story short, the Dutch enthusiasm for the sport was so infectious that I found myself draped in Oranje and a shoe on my head that year - and have kept up with the WC since.

So, the WC is my small way reconnecting with a country I love so much and hope to return to live someday. I was doing somersaults around my living room with every near-goal or would-be near goal. Anyway, from this American’s standpoint, I was just happy to see the team play on a TV station that I actually get and at a time when I’m at home, unlike many of the day-time games that have been running in the States.

Dank je wel, Nederland. I’ll watch for you at the EC.

Posted from  United States

Thanks to those who had kind comments about my little story. I’m glad you enjoyed it. I never did mention that after a few minutes, I asked some other guys to see their tickets, and realized that I was in the wrong section. So I wish my new found friends good luck and went to find my seats. I just didn’t match with my red in a sea of Orange! Later that evening I even got mistaken for a dutch fan while partying. I also noticed many Dutch fans just enjoying the night, even though their team had lost. That is the spirit we need more of.

You know…many of you are dejected but after the Euro match against Portugal (this match was very one sided despite the score). I think this was Portugal’s most dominating match of the Euro and I think you guys are on the right track with the youth movement. You have some quality young players and they need to experience the growing pains in order for them to mature, no matter how much it might suck now.

About this game. I don’t have much to add. Ultimately neither side wanted to play in this type of game but it’s just the way it evolved (devolved actually). Poor finishing let you down and I do think it was a tactical mistake not to insert RVN into the game. My friends and I a couple of times during the match, turned to each other and said, thank goodness RVN wasn’t in for that shot! Another key was Miguel’s job on Robben. He completely shut him down. Robben is an excellent young player (I watch him play often at Chelsea), but he is heavily left footed and relies on his speed, so when he goes up against someone just as fast, he is too easily taken out of the game. I’m sure he will learn to adapt.

Oh, and after watching that BULLSHIT simulation by the Italian player that resulted in a penalty, I suddenly don’t feel as bad about how crappy our game was. What a disgrace. I’m biased. I absolutely hate Italian football. I consider them “my germany”.

Maybe I will see some of you at the next Euro! I plan on making the trip out from California

Take care.
-Tony O

Posted from  United States

I think your assessment of the game is very accurate Tony.. Poor finishing, VB shouldve played VN, and Robben was most of the time cancelled by Miguel…

Im planning to come to austria for the euro in two year time as well.. hehe should I expect you on the dutch fan section of the stadium ??

Posted from  Russian Federation