Holland are breaking records

Thursday, 24 June 2010

Even though Holland's performances haven't been as spectacular as they have been in the past, Bert van Marwijk and his team are setting one record after the other.

The friendly against Ghana in Rotterdam (4-1), coming up to the World Cup, was the 18th game in a row without defeat. With that Van Marwijk overtook Louis van Gaal and Dick Advocaat, who had stayed unbeaten with Holland 17 straight games. At the moment that record stands at 21 games unbeaten.

That long series without defeat has now also made Bert van Marwijk the best manager Holland ever had, when we look at the average amount of points he gathered.

Holland have played 23 games since Van Marwijk took over after Euro 2008. They lost only one: on 6 September 2008 (Van Marwijk's second game in charge) Australia beat the Netherlands 1-2 in a friendly. Since then there were 16 victories and 5 draws, by which Van Marwijk averages 2.35 points per game. Van Basten is second in that ranking, with 2.23 points. However Van Basten was at the helm for 53 games.

Tonight against Cameroon another team record can be equaled.

If Holland were to beat Cameroon in their last game in Group E they will set a series of seven victories in a row.

Since the draw against Paraguay (0-0) in November of 2009 Oranje have won every game they played: United States (2-1), Mexico (2-1), Ghana (4-1), Hungary (6-1), Denmark (2-0) and Japan (1-0).

Twice before did Holland win seven consecutive games. They did so between March 2002 en February 2003 (Dick Advocaat) and between October 1971 and November 1972 (František Fadrhonc).

In the current series of victories Holland have scored 17 and conceded 4.

Then there is the personal record of goal keeper Maarten Stekelenburg. The Dutch shot stopper can beat the 36 year old record of Jan Jongbloed of not conceding during a World Cup.

In 1974 Jongbloed went with a clean sheet for 259 minutes. He was then beaten by an own goal of Ruud Krol in the game against Uruguay (4-1).

If Stekelenburg doesn't concede tonight against Cameroon until the 80th minute he will break that record.

Edwin van der Sar came close to that record at the 1998 World Cup. Oranje drew 0-0 against Belgium and beat South-Korea 5-0. Being 2-0 up against Mexico, the current Manchester United keeper seemed well on the way to break the record. But then Mexico pulled one back in the 75th minute. (They even went on to equalize in the dying seconds of the game.)

All games Holland have ever played