It is now certain that Clarence Seedorf will not star at next summer's World Cup in South Africa. The AC Milan-midfielder with 87 caps is not hoping for a phone call from Holland boss Bert van Marwijk anymore.

"With this coach I do not wish to go to the World Cup," Seedorf told Dutch magazine Voetbal International this week.

The discussion about Seedorf returning to the national team of the Netherlands has fired up because of his good performances for AC Milan recently. But despite of his playing well he did not get called up, not even when Sneijder, Robben and Van Persie were all out with an injury last month.

"Now that there has been some discussion about my returning to the national team I decided to clear up some things myself," Seedorf says.

"The boss needn't call me, if ever he intended to. I have closed the book on the World Cup. When Van Basten was coach I returned under similar circumstances and it didn't go well. I do not wish to go go through that again."

In 2008 Seedorf was part of Marco van Basten's preselection for Euro 2008, but in the weeks before the tournament he decided not to be available.

Since the arrival of Bert van Marwijk Seedorf has not received an invitation.

"When I decided not to come to Euro 2008 I said that I would be available after the tournament. My pulling out of the squad had everything to do with the situation at the time. Of course it has been bugging me that it doesn't seem to matter how well I play at Milan. I have always had the ambition to do well at a World Cup."

"The intellectualisation
of football has
always foundered
on a simple problem-
-the players. Doing
all your most
rewarding thinking
with your feet seems
to dull the philo-
sophical impulse.
Unless, of course,
you are Dutch.
According to legend,
Europeans played
a moronic, muscular
version of the world's
game, until Holland
proclaimed its vision
of total football in the
1974 World Cup,
and enlightenment
dawned."

From:
Brilliant Orange: The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Football