Van Basten keeps line-up a secret

It’s still unclear how Oranje will play Slovenia tonight. Dirk Kuyt trained with the starters’ shirt, but according to van Basten that doesn’t mean a thing.
Still, it will be clear that the team will be different to the one that played Rumania last Saturday.

Edwin van der Sar will back after his injury. Jaliens, Van der Vaart and Landzaat won’t be there and they all started against Rumania. The replacements are as yet not confirmed. During the last training the group did a 9 vs 9 match. “We played 11 vs 11 prior to Rumania, and you saw how that panned out,” Van Basten joked. “ I don’t want to go into too much. We just wanted a nice training session, just have some fun with the ball.”

It seems the offensive line-up with Babel, Robben and Huntelaar stays intact. No Kuyt, in other words. Van Basten commented on his relationship with Kuyt, “There is no animosity between him and me. We have a good relationship. He is disappointed and frustrated that he doesn’t play, but hey…that’s normal.”

Heitinga is probably the replacement of Jaliens. He needs to bring to the solution to our biggest problem, the build up from the back. It’s too slow, too predictable and it’s therefore very hard to break down a very defensive opponent.

This slow build up is a common thread in Oranje’s development. Whether it’s facing Andorra, Luxembourg or Rumania. The solution is not so obvious, according to the team manager. The de-briefing after the Rumania game didn’t take that long. “That may sound strange, but the organisation didn’t really fail. We didn’t have the form needed to break down their defenses. But you can’t change our building up in three days. It’s a structural issue, we need to grow and it will take time.”

And every decision you make up front has it’s repercussions at the back. “And playing a more offensive and creative player at the back brings a lot of risks as well. These types of players will always forget his direct opponent once or twice in a match.”

One worry is gone, though. The pitch in De Kuip was laden with bumps and irregularities. “This pitch is perfect. I am very pleased with it. The ball will run smoothly and it has more grass than the pitch in Rotterdam.”