Orange debacle

It has been masochistically fascinating watching the post-Euro-2012-exit inquisition of the Dutch football team on the BVN TV channel. Besides the fact that the tactical analysis is usually a cut above what one normally experiences on most English-language channels (witness Supersport's puerile, cliche-ridden analyses), I would venture that few nations grill their players and their coach so publically and as robustly as the Dutch do. The victims don't act defensively or hide either; they expect to be interrogated and give as good as they get.


Everybody seems to be stunned by the speed and depth of Oranje's denouement. Take a moment to reflect on four years of almost unbroken success under Van Marwijk: the qualification for World Cup 2010 was almost perfect; at the World Cup the team almost went all the way, albeit not in the style that most admirers of the Dutch school appreciated; the qualification for Euro 2012 was almost 100% perfect as well; and in this period Oranje was always ranked in the top 3 in the world and for a while number 1. Only in the few months before Euro 2012 did it become apparent that the wheels were wobbling, that something was amiss with the orange clockwork. At Euro 2012 the team was outplayed and out-thought - 'kansloos' - losing three on the trot, and losing badly. The intellectuals of the Dutch school are now picking over the bones of the carcass, forensically analysing every last fragment.

The consensus would appear to be the following:

• Reprises always fail: Van Marwijk tried the same formula, the same system and most of the same players as in 2010. Two years later many of these players are possibly over the hill, especially Van Bommel and Matthijsen. The system with two holding midfielders ('controleurs' is such a nice word) in front of the back four made Holland difficult to break down in 2010. Then the team was compact, played a conservative game and was able to overcome weaker individual performances. This time the opposition had analysed them and figured out how to combat the system. But also, the Dutch were under pressure to be more expansive this time, to attack, which meant longer distances between the lines especially after loss of possession. De Jong and Van Bommel especially were unable to maintain an effective action radius, were often pulled out of position and could not make the runs required to close space down quickly.
• A weak collective: In 2010 the team worked as a tight unit. This time it was shocking to see the fragmentation of the collective. It was like watching a group of six defenders trying to defend without any backtracking or pressing from the four attackers. Or when the forwards pressed the defenders retreated. Two separate teams thus. But worse, when in possession the attackers were unco-ordinated, rigidly structured, the movement off the ball was poor or non-existent while the defenders didn't have the quality to build play, nor the initative (or freedom?) to join in the attacks. In Schneider's words: the football was 'totaal weg' - totally gone.
• Bipolar: Although in some matches Holland had the lion's share of the possession, most of the passes were played square or backwards and the build-up ponderous. As Cruiff noted, when you are being pressed you need to play incisive, deeper passes two lines deep and then move forward onto the second ball. To do that, however, you at least need defenders who can pass incisively. This was one of the most striking differences between Holland and Germany: De Jong and Van Bommel were most often in possession but unable to build play after the first 20 minutes, while Schweinsteiger, who is a very fine deep-lying, passing midfielder a bit in the mould of Guardiola, was the one who played the telling passes.
  
  Secondly, the team was completely unbalanced. All the quality resided in the attackers, while the defensive six were of much lesser quality, or too old. The powerful Dutch sides of the past always had outstanding, footballing defenders as well - think of Krol, Rijkaard, Koeman, Frank de Boer ...
• Egoes: That old problem reared its head again and it seems clear as the inquisition unfolds that certain players poisoned the team atmosphere. That much was also obvious in the way the team played: they never played for each other nor played in the service of the team, and all too often talented individuals tried to make the difference by themselves, by trying the dribble, playing the killer pass, opting for the long-range shot (Van Persie, Robben, Schneider, Van der Vaart).

Every 10 to 12 years the Dutch turn out a golden generation of footballers. There have been four such generations:

• Mid-70s: the wonder, total-footballing generation of Cruijff, Neeskens, Rensenbrink, Krol and Van Hanegem that made two World Cup finals and should have won at least one of them;
• The late-80s: the one generation that did win something - Euro 88. This was the team of Koeman, Rijkaard, Gullit and Van Basten - that then imploded at World Cup 1990;
• The late-90s: the generation of Bergkamp, Kluivert, and the De Boer twins that came closer to winning World Cup 1998 than many realise and really should have nailed Euro 2000;
• This generation: at World Cup 2010 it came close but the style was reviled by Dutch purists. Euro 2012 was its big chance with the star players in their prime, and in form (Van Persie and Huntelaar were English Premier League and Bundesliga top-scorers respectively). Yet it crashed and burned spectacularly. And betrayed its promise.

Whatever some say, however, here is a small nation that, like Uruguay, punches way beyond its weight in world football. And it has brought the world some of the great tactical revolutions and wonderful players.