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Matchday 5. What did we learn?

June 12th, 2008 | By: Jan | 18 Comments »

Deco: a big football brain

It’s not good being a host of the tournie. Germany in 1988, Sweden in 1992, England in 1996, Holland in 2000, Portugal in 2004 and now look at Switzerland…

Guus Hiddink is not amused with the performance of his team.

Goose does not have access to internet during the tournament and is sorely missed.

Portugal’s away jersey (white with dark red collar and green numbers on the back) looks really good.

Deco may have aged and lost some pizzazz but the man is still very very intelligent.

Scolari moves to Chelsea.

Portugal will be one of the teams we will need to trash in order to win the title.

Turkey is still alive.

Marco tries hard to play down the fave-role.

Wesley Sneijder is the Oranje DJ, picking songs on his i-pod soundsystem to play in the dressing room before the match. DJ Wes.

Ibrahimovic is thoroughly impressed with Sneijder’s progress.

You can write your ass off during the qualifications, but it’s during the big ones that the fans show up and share their thoughts.

The BBC still believes Ruud was off side. They also think the English invented football…

Tags: Deco, Euro 2008, Goose, Holland, Melchiot, Oranje, Robben, Sneijder, van Nistelrooy

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Comments

By julien | June 12th, 2008 at 6:45 am

Hey Belgium had trouble in 2000 too. We dual hosted with the Netherlands that year.

Posted from United States

By Jan | June 12th, 2008 at 7:10 am

You are so right! I kinda lost Belgium from my radar in the last years. What’s with our neighbors??

Posted from Australia

By Carlos | June 12th, 2008 at 7:24 am

Whilst Jan is stacking zzzzzzzzzzz in the great Oz I just read that Robben is fit for France ! Well I hope that scares the Froggies but it really makes not much difference to me …..

Posted from Singapore

By Ono | June 12th, 2008 at 7:37 am

Love Deco as a Barca fan, but hate him as an Oranje fan. A bit confusing.

Stoitchkov once said,”just hearing the name of Real Madrid makes me want to vomit.” Now, I want to say,”just hearing the name of Portugal makes me want to vomit.”

Posted from Japan

By ferenc | June 12th, 2008 at 8:32 am

Ono: i have exactly the same controversial feelings toward deco. but he’s really great and orchestrates brilliantly the portuguese team.

Posted from Hungary

By Michel-Olivier | June 12th, 2008 at 9:22 am

how can we face portugal when we are in group c?
i don’t think portugal can beat the germans.

Posted from United States

By Caleb | June 12th, 2008 at 10:01 am

Jan, I think you are being too nice to the Portuguese… as Dutch fans we are supposed to ignore anything good that they do and only focus on their bad points

Posted from Canada

By Jess | June 12th, 2008 at 10:30 am

That’s o.k. The BBC can love Italy all they want. Here in Canada TSN is carrying on a HUGE love affair with Portugal and Crissy Ronaldo himself. Anything the Dutch do is either marginal or we are being too hopefull. Hopefully our match against France will show that we are not a “Fluke” as Mr Howard likes to put it.

By Frank | June 12th, 2008 at 10:53 am

Regardless of the BBC a huge number of English fans support Oranje in this competition.

Posted from United Kingdom

By Bob | June 12th, 2008 at 11:29 am

The France match now becomes very important for the Dutch, now that they have so wonderfully defeated the Italians. Here’s why–If Italy defeats Romania and France defeats Holland, then France moves to first place and Italy ties with the Dutch. If Romania defeats Italy, and France wins, then France and Romania tie for first…The conclusion is that in this match with France, “we” should either tie or win to make it possible to be first or second in the group. I am operating on the assumption that “we” will defeat Romania, although that is not a given and Romania could go through as well. What great and interesting times now in the tournament!

Posted from United States

By Pedro | June 12th, 2008 at 12:24 pm

Thanks for the compliments back at our blog, Jan.
The same back to you on your victory against Italy - you broke their defense and then they weren´t so big anymore…
Deco is really great. We call him “O Mágico” - I guess this one doesn´t need translation. Scored one against the czechs and created two more, out of nothing.
All the best for Oranje too.

Posted from Netherlands

By finnster01 | June 12th, 2008 at 12:47 pm

What is this? Portugese lovefest all of a sudden on the Oranje blog of all places?

@Pedro, you can take all your El Divo’s and stuff them very far up a certain place where the sun doesn’t shine too often, even in Portugal. I could not give a rats arse about Deco, the worlds best diver Ronaldo, or any other midgetsize footballer wishing they were Spanish and played for Real Madrid.

We still have a very unsettled score with your guys and don’t think for a moment that a lot of Holland fans have forgotten that. I certainly have not, and nothing would be better for me personally than to send you crashing home with your Chelsea coach and Ronaldo crying on the bus again.

Posted from United States

By finnster01 | June 12th, 2008 at 1:04 pm

And after a smashing performance today by Croatia, looks like Portugal may play Germany in the quarter final!!! Which means that at least one of my most hated teams will not reach the semi’s.

I know there are quite a few other Oranje fans grinning right now and sharing my sentiments:-) HaHaHaHaHa. Absolutely brilliant!!!!

Posted from United States

By Bart | June 12th, 2008 at 1:09 pm

Germany just lost to Croatia!!
2-1, this is huge

Posted from Canada

By Matt C. | June 12th, 2008 at 1:22 pm

For the first game, the Dutch had the benefit of low expectations. Not so against France now, but I’d rather they be the next opponent than Roumania. Provided Roumania can keep Italy on edge and we beat France, it’s smooth sailing.

Posted from Canada

By Stan Lee, Los Angeles | June 12th, 2008 at 3:30 pm

Holland all the way biatchesss…..it’s time for some total beautiful football and may the Brazillians of europe reign!

Posted from United States

By Jan | June 12th, 2008 at 4:50 pm

I read in Hugo Borst’s column that Marco van Basten was very negative and crude to the Dutch press. After some papers made up stories about horrendous challenges on the Dutch secret training sessions, he gave the Dutch press the cold shoulder on one of the press conferences.

Borst felt unjustly attacked by Marco (maybe we should write about challenges by coaches on journo’s at secret press conferences ) and writes that some press people decided to ban Dutch press conferences!

Great! I remember that coaches use this external enemy to create unity in their group. Once it were the Dutch officials, in Italy it’s always the media, etc etc. If it works, it works. I won’t complain!

Posted from Australia

By Robert | June 12th, 2008 at 8:34 pm

Jan, Marco wasn’t the only one that was pissed with the Dutch press; Sneijder gave them a piece of his mind too about the way they portrayed Robben as if he was made of crystal.
I have to say though that many of these reporters are truly obnoxious

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