10 Sep 2009(Thu)

September 8, 2009: If it was painful at times for the players, it was painful all the time for the pro-blue viewers of the Holland-Japan friendly on Saturday.

Rarely can the Dutch have played so badly for so long, lacking motivation and the urgency to step up the pace.

Yet still Japan could not score during their long periods of possession. Why did Okazaki try to control Shunsuke’s pass over the top in the opening minutes? Why didn’t he just hit it, so close to goal? After all, he had plenty of time to read the flight of the ball over the defender and get himself into position to shoot.

I say “possession” in the paragraph above rather than “domination” because Japan never dominated their opponents, despite having a lot of the ball in the first hour. Did they ever look dangerous in the last third of the pitch? How many clear-cut chances did they create?

It was like the Dutch were prepared to sit back and soak it up, and then just win the one-on-ones with the physical strength of their defenders against the lightweight Japanese attackers.

In the second half, the Dutch moved up from first to second gear and scored three times in the last 21 minutes. Japan, I am afraid to say, collapsed; a worrying thought because Holland were playing like it was a training game.

A quick word on the fouls by Nigel de Jong and Wesley Sneijder. De Jong’s foul on Shunsuke was clearly well planned, targeting his left foot, and the Japanese playmaker was lucky to escape injury in “metatarsal territory”.  No yellow. That would come later for a challenge on Nagatomo.

As for Sneijder, he would have been sent off immediately for his two-footed lunge on Hasebe if it had been in the World Cup or a club game, but the referee was lenient because it was only a friendly. No wonder Dutch coach Bert van Marwijk apologised to the referee at half-time for the violent conduct of his players.

Footnote to the younger Japanese readers with Oranje stars in their eyes: Even in the glory days of the 1970s, the Cruyff-led team in 1974 and Cruyff-less version in 1978, the Dutch could always look after themselves in the physical side of the game. It wasn’t only Total Football that took them to two World Cup finals, so don’t be too surprised at the occasional bone-crunching challenge.

ends