Hiddink shows glimpses of his Oranje

Oops!! I forgot to give you my prediction!!

Well, I think we will win this 3-1. The Turks will score a late consolation goal. I think we’ll grab them by the throat and score an early goal (15 minutes or so) via Huntelaar. This will allow us to settle and before half time it’s Depay or Sneijder scoring a second. In the second half, almost an hour in,we score a third. Probably again Huntelaar. Hiddink will make some changes (Huntelaar, Sneijder, Wijnaldum) and the Turks will be able to score a cheap goal.

With RVP and Robben sidelined, most people are keen to find out what Guus is doing for the Turkey match. This match, remember, is a must-win match. The Spain friendly is irrelevant. It’s probably relevant for the Spanish, as they will want revenge. But we don’t really care. If we lose against Turkey, we can’t be bothered. And if we win against Turkey, we probably can’t be bothered either :-).

I mean, winning against Spain is all well and good, but it won’t bring us closer to the Euro.

So all eyes are on Guus and his lads. Guus, who used to coach Turkey. One would almost forget. The campaigns he had with South Korea and Australia will never be forgotten. His previous Oranje stint was shabby either. But the Russian job was ok but the Turks decided to let the man go. But Turkey didn’t improve after Hiddink. Far from it actually.

hiddink coaxhing

But today, he’s ours again. The journeyman used his influence to get rivals Huntelaar and Van Persie to become mates. Who’d thunk? They were rivals for a long while. Both central strikers and not very cleverly handled by Van Gaal. Who first pointed at Klaas Jan as his main striker, only to quickly use RVP when he noticed the Man United man was in glorious shape. Klaas Jan is used to being sidelined in Oranje, but already has 70 games under his belt and an average of 1 goal every 99 minutes!! ( Klaas Jan: “That is an annoying statistic, because we’d need 9 minutes of extra time against Turkey for me to score!”)

Kluivert’s tally is Hunter’s next goal and if he really has his swagger back he might even challenge Van Persie. The two had a fall out, publically, on the pitch against Kazachstan. Van Persie didn’t pass the ball to the open Hunter and the Schalke man politely informed RVP about his thoughts.

Hiddink did what apparently no coach before him ever tried: he told the two to grab a coffee together. Huntelaar: “We never did that before. I never drank a coffee with Robin. Mostly, because Robin doesn’t drink coffee, hahaha. But seriously, we were never friends. We never played together, which is different for me than my relationship with Robben or Sneijder. We never played together in the past. We simply never really connected. But Hiddink played us together and told us we could look forward to more of this. And now we have had our one on one, we actually enjoy talking to each other. We sometimes call each other up now. Just to have a bit of a chat. It’s good.”

KJ RVP

Van Persie and Huntelaar together, with Robben in a free role. It resulted in 6 goals. The Hunter will have to do it without the two veterans but will have two younger forwards with him. “We have enough talent to make it work. Sure, we’ll miss Arjen and Robin but that’s football. Turkey is a tough opponent, but we’ll win this. I’m 1000% convinced.” The former Ajax man was not keen to name names: “The coach will decide who he plays. I’m cool with any solution. We have players that can play like real wingers, we have players who want to come centrally, either way…. I can deal with any situation.”

Hiddink did practice with both Dost and Huntelaar, but the sharp observer saw that this was a tactic being practiced in case Oranje would be behind. Huntelaar: “This team can play many different systems. And with a player like Dost, we can play long balls. We have players like Sneijder, Clasie, De Vrij and Blind. They are all capable of position a ball on your necktie.”

unter head

Stefan de Vrij, the Lazio defender, obtained a bit of a swagger in Rome. Where Strootman was hailed as a rock star when he was signed, De Vrij walked around Rome unnoticed in his first weeks in Italy. Not any more. With Lazio on a firm third spot in the Serie A, the ex Feyenoord man has built up some sensational statistics. “They keep track of everything in Italy. The number of interceptions a defender makes is similar to the number of assists for a winger or the goals of a striker. In that competition, I am actually number 1.” De Vrij is being humble. His statistics are even great on an international level. The pessimistic Lazio supporters believe the quiet defender might be sold to a European top team even, this summer. “I noticed I made some big steps. I played Luca Toni some time back with Feyenoord and he owned me. Last week I played him again and he didn’t touch the ball. I know people in Holland always say Dutch defenders need to become more gritty and tough, but I don’t get a lot of complaints in Italy.” The land of strong defenders… Both Blind and De Vrij will collect their silver platter tomorrow, for their first anniversary in Oranje.

blind de vrij

It seems Hiddink will pick De Vrij as one of the first players when making his list on the team sheet. Cillesen will be on there too, along with Sneijder and Huntelaar. There will be some question marks too. Depay is not necessarily Hiddink’s first choice. The PSV man has had some run ins with Guus before and will need to step up a bit, according to insiders. It seems Clasie and Wijnaldum might start alongside Sneijder in midfield. Which could mean that Blind starts on the bench. Because should Depay start as left winger, it makes sense to use Jetro Willems as left back. As Steve mentioned in a comment, Blind would be an interesting option as center back, given that he played there a lot in the youth and had a number of good games for Ajax 1 in that role too.

I wouldn’t be surprised myself if Hiddink uses Afellay as a false winger. This will allow him to use a 4-3-3 style system with possession and a 4-4-2 without possession (Afellay dropping back when we lost the ball).

Hiddink is holding his cards close to his chest so we’ll need to wait and see what happens.

The good thing is, that Luuk de Jong lashed an elbow in Bruma’s face and drew blood.

Or let me rephrase: the good thing is that the lads train at a high intensity level. The training is tough, intense and with aggression. Something we will need to “replace” Arjen Robben.

Sneijderskipper

It is all seriousness and gravitas currently in the Oranje camp but Wes Sneijder couldn’t help but lift the spirits with some comments. The former Real Madrid man is happy with his skipper role. “I don’t look back with negative feelings about me losing the band. We have been through that. It has been discussed and the topic lies at the cemetery for me. No, in general it is good to be the skipper for your country. And against Turkey, in a big match! Last time I scored against them, I didn’t celebrate. But this time I will. Not only that, I will cheer very loud!!” This last comment is a sarcastic nod to Van Gaal’s shout out when a journalist asked what he would do if Sneijder would score…

Hiddink is a fan of relaxed. Take it easy. Do normal, then you do crazy enough. Hiddink, like Huntelaar, is from the Achterhoek (the Back-corner) as the area east of everything is called. The fun factor at the last public training was Joost. A Down Syndrome kid who was present and commentated the training really loud. He knew all the names of all the players, but he kept calling Hiddink “Louis van Gaal”. Hiddink: “Isn’t that just fun? This lad, his spontaneity and his openness? Great.” But all fun aside, Sneijder said: “Tomorrow, the fun needs to stop. Particularly for Turkey. We are 6 points behind the Cechs and 3 behind Iceland. France will be far away in the distance if we let this game slide.” Hiddink looked back at the press conference on his time as Turkish team manager. “We missed the Euros in 2012 narrowly. It took the decider vs Croatia and that is a strong nation. Turkish players are very skilled but sometimes undisciplined. Once the emotions run riot, you sometimes lose them.”


 

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69 comments

  1. thanks jan brillant.all ready feeling better over a cup of coffee.Bring on the Turks.

    Jan how do rate the Turk squad especially with Collin Kazim Richards who knows quite bit about Hiddink and Eredivise.

    1. The Turks are a mid table type nation for Europe. If Spain, Germany, Holland and Italy are top, Turkey sits in the middle range for me, with Denmark, Croatia, Russia. Difficult to beat when on song. They have physical strength, they have skills and they are opportunistic. Also lacking in team play and tactics and discipline. Hot headed. I don’t rate Kazim too high. He is a leader and a strong personality but not the greatest of players. He is a warrior but lacks the clinical skills in the box of – say – the Hunter. On a good day, they can hurt us though!

  2. Hunter and RVP part is jus beauty and I will always salute Hiddink for that. But is this a indication that,thats whats in store for Euro 2016. I mean Hunter and RVP Partnership.Well being inform will definitely depend on if both Schalke and Man United qialify for CL but looking at Morrata today who scored his maddien goal on his debut today and also Harry Kane,you jus feel guilty that NT needs a new cover page.

    Bast Dost and Luuk De Jong ,are they complacent enough. given the time thats left for ECs. I dont think both of them are in level with the form of some of the young emerging strikers who have individualy talents.

  3. with Wolfburg in prime position to qualify for CL we should expect to see Bast Dot full potential at the highest level.
    Now what if he doesnt excel in the CL coz im sure Wolfburg will want to bloster their squad for CL and they will definitely look to bring a new striker. well leaving competition aside coz Nicolas Bendtner is also there,Dots selection in NT was purely based on his recent goal scoring form.Things might change if Wolfburg go to the market for a top striker which I think will eventuate given the consistence of both Dot and Bendtner.

    What happens then more competition.less playing time,will there be enough time for Hiddink to experiment other. strikers.

    something to consider Guus.

  4. with also Sneijder receiving the armband does this mean he is in Hiddinks plan for ECs well its kind of tight but if things doesnt change soon we might find our selves in par with Sweden and Portgual Where Ronaldo and Ibrahamvic are potray the whole team.

  5. Jan, you are a real trooper, quite a dedicated & noble individual with plenty of heart and passion for your blog. This is why I come back here, even when we are down and out. I admire your selfless and giving nature. Respect.

    I’m curious to hear your thoughts on a few things.

    – Kluivert coaching Curacao – Cant believe this big dude is coaching my tiny island. Amazing and strange, what are your thoughts here? Obviously my heart is with NL but I can’t deny I am proud of my little island too.

    – Life without RVP – We need to get used to this. I am fine with it, how about you?

    – Our future – We briefly spoke about this but can you please do a piece on this?

    – Sneijder possibly retaining captaincy for the rest of QF until the Euro final =)

    – Will Strootman really come back stronger? Will he come back at all?

    I look forward to seeing Dost.

    Cheers

    1. Hey man, thanks for your kind words!!! means a lot to me. I started this blog after doing this for the Netherlands. worldcupblog since 2006! Almost 10 years. It takes time to do and it costs money :-).

      I have had great times with great friendships but also had some sour times. I almost lost a good friend. I actually lost one (dear Finn, who died) and more….

      But the Dutch national team unites, so that is wonderful.

      I hope I can manage to keep this going :-).

      Your questions:

      Kluivert coaching Curacao is magic I think :-). He has a soft spot for the islands and I think he’s taking it easy as his partner/wife is going through a difficult time re: health. I’m sure we’ll see Patrick back at a high level as he definitely is a coach with a future. I expect him to be on the short list to replace Frank de Boer at Ajax!

      Life without RVP: I think life without Robben is a tougher one. RVP has always been just around the corner as he has had long spells of absence from the team. He has divided as much as united, so to speak. He can be difficult and he hasn’t always produced. He is a sensational talent of course and I don’t see anyone as yet like him. Depay, Boetius, Kishna, Sinkgraven, Zivkovic, I am not yet impressed. (Depay is good though, but will he be as good as RVP or Robben??).

      We need leaders and I rate Strootman and Clasie high in that regard.

      Strootman…your guess is as good as mine. We’ll need to see how Wes performs. He is very fit at the moment and I do hope he’ll get a last big transfer this summer. Even to Ajax, as far as I’m concerned. But preferable something better: Bundesliga, Serie A or even Southampton would work for me :-).

      I’ll do a separate future piece after the Spain game.

  6. I still dont get the critics,yeh surely we will miss Robben,but RVP abaence,no big deal we have got Klass Jan Huntelaar. Im sure Hunter must be all hyped up knowing moment like this wont comr everday to come out id both Robben and RVPs shadow which has hauntes him for ever.

    The important thing hear is what Hiddink was priotising in practise seassion. Quote “with clear instruction of getting the ball into the box as soon as possible”

    Afellay —-Hunter—Narsingh

    ———-Sneijder————

    This formation will suit huntelaar big time as along sneijder feed the ball first with both Narsingh and Afellay coming with those timely crosses.

  7. Manchester United had virtually won every single game when ever they played with out vanpersie..As of now they are unbeaten for 4 games,including fluid games vs Liverpool and Spurs…So its a blessing for orange,and hunter…He will not be missed..He has became slow and he plays offside all the time like he spoiled vs Arjentina in WC…and he spoiled many games of Manunited…
    Hiddink is goin to deploy
    Afellay———-Hunter——-Narsingh
    ————sneijder—————-
    ——Clasie———-Nijel————–
    Blind——BMI–Devrij——Janmaat
    —————Cillessen————-its almost confirmed………
    What worries me most is BMI at the back…LAst time we played with BMI,Blind and Afellay on left we failed miserably.I hope hiddink learns from past mistakes..I dont feel safe with BMI at the back…
    Then lots of thing depend on Afellay and sneijder fitness,we need legs and lungs to beat this turkey team…If Afeally stops his stupid dribbling then concentrates on crossing to Hunter,he can contribute better than Depay for sure..he sits in bench of greek club and i have no idea about his fitness and stamina…
    Anyways our Guy sneijder is not a pussy and he will give victory for orange at any cost if BMI supports..
    As long as sneijder is fit he should be our captain not RVP…RVP is done with age so is vaart…

  8. Final 11…….its confirmed..
    ———–Cillessen,————–
    Wiel,—–de Vrij,———Indi———-Blind,
    ———Clasie———–, Nigel————-
    ————— Sneijder——————–,
    Narsingh,——— Huntelaar,————Afellay
    Why the hell is BMI………shit

  9. I believe this is an official line up of Oranje for today game: 4:4:2

    Jasper Cillessen
    Stefan de Vrij
    Daley Blind
    Daryl Janmaat
    Bruno Martins Indi
    Wesley Sneijder
    Jordy Clasie
    Georginio Wijnaldum
    Nigel de Jong
    Klaas Jan Huntelaar
    Bas Dost

  10. What a useless game. Afellay loses the ball on every possession. Depay sucks. The defense sucks too. The only good player who is playing well is Blind. The rest are all terrible

    1. exxactly..well said wissor3!

      everyone looks so mediocre…

      only blind looks a cut apart…reflection of the fact that man united went for him instead of overrated shit

  11. HT 0-1 for Turkey 🙁

    Awful deflection from Indi past Cillessen, who looked to me like he would have saved the shot.. sloppy defending on the play, but the disappointing part for me so far is that the Dutch are building up way too slowly and Turkey seem like they are fighting harder.

  12. hiddink please save face…admit you’re wrong..

    put on Clasie and Klassen for de Jong & Wijnaldum!

    please take off the disastrous van der wiel and put on JANMAAT!

  13. Very bad game, just do not want to watch it….I do not think this is about Hiddink, this is about entire Dutch football, it is in recession…

    1. If we want to qualify Hiddink should be sacked…!! There is no ifs and buts about it, the team has no plan. Then only wins that we have under Hiddink were against poor opponents. Any average team out there can beat us right now. As for the quality of our players there is no doubt that besides Robben all the other players are mediocre but we still have better quality than any other team on our group. I don’t want to sound negative cause I was exited when Guus took over but we have to look at the reality with the same players we finished third in the WC and now we struggle to beat Kazakstan!! Ronald de Boer might be right by saying that Hiddink is outdated for today’s football…

  14. Pathetic to watch, hopelessly hoofing the balls into box. Even England plays better than that. Looks like Hiddink doesn’t have a plan at all.

    Sneijder the old guard to the rescue again. The time where Narsingh carried the ball till the edge of the box and passed it all the way back to our own half was really painful to watch.

    Narsingh, Willems and Depay all missed a golden chance to score.

  15. Flop of the game… Depay, Narsingh, Wijnaldum and Van Der Weil. Dost was lively and I like what I saw from him.

    Afellay Bette run a central position but he holds onto the ball for too long.

  16. quote of the night (from sky sports or whatever): “this is not total football, this is limited football”

    This ^^ plus the Narsingh back pass made my night…

    Hiddink doesn’t have a clue. Half the players don’t have a clue. Nobody’s running, nobody’s taking the spaces. Painful.

    1. There was no space to run.. The only thing that they could have done was take players one on one. You don’t have players capable of doing that.. Depay cannot take players one on one. He is no Robben. That should have been clear by now. In 2004 ROBBEN was 20 and he torched the Czech republic.

      Narsingh was okay in some of his possession but then again, none of the players can really take a match by the scruff of the neck like Robben.

      Turkey played with 9 behind the ball playing some aggressive football.

  17. I am reading after-match interviews of Dutch players. Looks like they are happy with the point, which was earned on their soil with mediocre Turkish team….KJH says that “we need to focus on third place now as we can not reach Iceland and Czechs”…. Current mindset of Dutch team is not that positive. I do not think this team will go far. I agree that this is a team of Arjen Robben and without him Oranje looks very passive. I also agree that the quality of most of the players, especially Eredivisie ones, is not competitive. However, majority of players from this team played under van Gaal and became third in the World…What has happened? The answer is simple: coach…GH is a great coach but I do not think with this team he knows what he is doing. To be honest with you, I am also clueless why this is happening with Guus…Last but not least, I do not see anybody who would successfully replace Guus at this stage of the competition. However, if KNVB decides to sack Guus, this is the right time to do as there are still three months before Dutch resumes their Euro campaign.

    1. AZ I don’t agree about the players. They can’t be worse than the unknowns of Turkey, Chzech and Iceland players. Most of them got to 3rd place in WC. It is the coach. KNVB fucked up big time with him and now they will have to sack him with team elimination hanging by a thread. GH would never do better than LVG. Instead of retiring in honor before signing for the fat check with KNVB he will leave in shame. In his best days he was a good coach but never great, now he is less than mediocre. Greedy mf.

  18. France vs Holland 2-0

    LVG had Both Robben and strootman injured. He brought in eredivise players but were fired by the french.You cannot find tune a team overnight especially when without your top players.

    Hiddink case is same but his player selection was bad,I will admit that. I mean without Robben,Lens,Strootman,RVP,Vlaar and van Ginkle,you cannot jus assemble a team and expect them to win. selection Of BMI,Blind at LB ,afellay to start on the right was wrong.

    90+5 minutes certainly we were spared and yet live to see another day. we r still in the race and hopefully if we face the same delima again Guus will learn from todays game of to what to expect.

    he needs time to work players. jus when things were looking good with RVP and Hunter partnership,the injury to RVP disrupted that rythm after Lativa game and resulted in new approach with new players.I mean its not easy to come with a perfect team when you are given what 1-2 weeks. I dont think coach will be able to do that in those kind of situation,so

    Guus pliz

  19. eI mean you look at the selection of players. Narsingh and Promes r selected for RW but Afellay starts there,three Right footed centre back r selected compared to 1 left footed,BMI who is warming bench at porto.The fucking problem here is those fuckers want to always treat Blind as a utility player when he is a ass hole.this is yet another games which confirms he shouldnt be playing at LB or CB. These are some of the decisions that backfired for Guus.

    1. Afellay was shifting to the middle consistently, so he had to replace him with a natural winger so the Narsingh change.

      Nigel de Jong switch was a tactical switch to 4-4-2 as he was replaced with Bas Dost. Bmi switch was to get the left wing a bit more pace and probably to avoid the dumb mistakes BMI is capable of making. He passed three or four balls in front of the Turkish attackers that he was lucky were not turned over.

  20. Guus Hiddink has admitted he doesn’t know how to solve Netherlands’ current problems after they stuttered to a 1-1 draw at home to Turkey in their latest Euro 2016 qualifier.

    The Oranje trailed to Burak Yilmaz’s strike until well into injury-time, when Wesley Sneijder’s strike was deflected home by the head of Klaas-Jan Huntelaar.
    Holland are now third in Group A, six points behind leaders Czech Republic, with Hiddink stating after the game that his side are nowhere near Europe’s best nations.

    He said to NOS: “Of course I can get this team back to its best, but at this moment I don’t know how yet.
    “It wasn’t a good game from us, but I’m satisfied with the result. In the end, this can be a very important draw.
    “We shouldn’t talk too big about ourselves, because we are not one of the top teams in Europe. The third place at the World Cup in Brazil was fantastic, but you have to look through that result. Look at the reality.”

    Hiddink was without two of his star men, with Arjen Robben and Robin van Persie both absent through injury, but Sneijder said that was no excuse for the performance at the Amsterdam Arena.

    “From the first minute we played to win this game,” the Galatasaray midfielder said.
    “We dominated posession and created some opportunities but they got only one big chance and they scored immediately. We played the game, but we didn’t create enough. Yes, I’m relieved that I scored the equaliser in injury-time.

    “In the second half we have we played more opportunistic, especially after Bas Dost came on the pitch. We didn’t play bad, but we didn’t play good as well. We cannot blame the coach for this result. We have to be sharper and we must not point the finger to someone else. The absence of Robin van Persie and Arjen Robben may not be an excuse as well.”

    The introduction of debutant Bas Dost in the second half was at least a small glimmer of positivity for Holland, with the Wolfsburg striker admitting his special night had been soured by the result.
    “I don’t have a good feeling, despite my debut for Oranje,” he said.

    “You always hope you can come in, but with this scoreline it wasn’t ideal. With the long balls we created some danger and we could have even won this one.

    “At home against Turkey we are obliged to win, but we didnt. It was my first time that I was in the squad so I just try to give my best. We are kind of sad right now, but we have to be happy with a point after all.”

  21. Fire this clown ASAP, get rid of Afellay and BMI and you have a decent team which shouldn’t have trouble to go through. But at this stage the damage may have been done. Very hard to qualify. Missing the tournament would be a long term effect disaster.
    This draw may give Hiddink a shot to continue. I almost wish we had lost so this clown was fired.

  22. Holladn must get rid of Afellay,BMI,Wijnaldum(not for attitude,Slow brain),Van der weil at the earliest.Followed by Depay, and Narsingh…
    This Guy hiddink says he doesnt know how to fix the holland team….Then why the hell he is the coach???/
    He is a one diamentional coach who is not able to think out of the box.
    @Hiddink -Get rid of the forementioned players
    then slecet
    Willems———-Hunter————Van Rhijn
    —————-Van Ginkel——————
    ——–Toonstra——–Klassen————
    —————–De Vrij——————
    Blind——–Kongolo—–Vanbeek——Janmaat
    ——————Cillessen——————-
    ====================================================
    then second 11
    Annholt————Luuk Dejong———Singraven
    ——————Clasie———————–
    ———Hendrix———-Find————–
    ———————Ake———————–
    Buttner——–Vrijil——Bruma——–Find
    ——————-Krul————————–
    Rest of th guys are not good enough to play…..
    take sneijder and Roben only when they are fit

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