Weekend Action, PT2

Mario Been didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. His club had just secured a draw at home against rival FC Twente, with a late equalizer by Roy Makaay. The veteran sub kept his head cool to convert the questionable penalty kick awarded by a shonky leading Roel Luinge.

It was an eventful afternoon in De Kuip. Feyenoord played a strong first half but simply forgot to score. De Guzman had his first chance in the first 60 seconds but mistimed his header. Cisse had numerous free chances but either overlooked the unmarked team mates or his aim was too high. Goalie Boschker stopped De Guzman for scoring an outrageous free-kick and Slory hit the bar from great distance.

In the meantime, Luinge had been dealing out weird yellow cards left and right and at one time gave Twente a free kick just outside of the box of Feyenoord for hands. By a Twente player! It took the Twente player to fess up – with several Feyenoorders going ballistic – before he wanted to overrule his own decision. Right before that, Feyenoord coach Mario Been had stopped a ball out of play, only to be told by Luinge that the ball was actually in play. It took the linesman and Twente coach McClaren to let Luinge see the light. Another bad Luinge show in De Kuip, in other words.

Twente sub Nicky Kuiper opened the score for the visitors, however, and for a long time it seemed Feyenoord lacked the energy late in the second half to equalize. With McClaren sent off to the stands, it took Makaay’s late penalty to offer some justice to Feyenoord.

Been: “I feel we deserved to win based on our game in the first half. We played excellent football then, but simply forgot to score. I’m happy with the point, now, but in reality we should have won…”

McClaren. “I’m not sure what happened here today… Weird things were going on before and during the match and I am not referring to what the teams did, if you know what I mean…” (referring to referee Luinge). “I’ve never seen a referee doing a warm up before the game and applauding and interacting with the Feyenoord fans. With this late penalty, I’m sure next time the fans will applaude him back.”

Ajax won 3-0 against Heracles in a boring, slow paced game. It took Ajax an hour – and later a man down for Heracles – to secure the three points. Aldeweireld, Cvitanich and Aissati scored for Ajax. Jol: “It wasn’t good, in particular the first half was bad. But we did what we needed to do, although I must confess we were helped by that Heracles red card.”

PSV won their tough away game against Groningen, 2-0. Two goals by Danny Koevermans, who got the starting position at the cost of Toivonen. And Koevermans was the difference. Groningen could have scored too, but they simply haven’t been able to replace super striker Berg – who left for the Bundesliga – while PSV did have a strong target man in Koevermans.

AZ regained the lead in Holland, with Feyenoord, Twente and PSV on second spot.