Eljero Elia is ready for the World Cup

Sunday 16 May 2010

Eljero Elia almost missed out on the World Cup because of an ankle injury, but the advise of his team mate Ruud van Nistelrooy put him on the right track. Now he's all set to do give it his best at the World Cup.

"I'll be 100% fit for the World Cup but there was a period when it didn't look like that," says the mercury winger of HSV Hamburg. The doctors at the club wouldn't see how serious his injury was and as a consequence it wouldn't heal. It took the advise of Van Nistelrooy to make real progress. "He told met go see another doctor for a second opinion." Immediate surgery is what followed and it was all just in time to be ready for South Africa.

A long period of therapy followed and again it was Van Nistelrooy who helped him on when he lost faith. "Ruud cheered me up, always motivated me to do a little more when I felt I was ready."

All the while he stayed in touch with Bert van Marwijk, and that's an indication of the status Elia has in the Dutch team. "I remember I was nervous during the first training with Oranje. "Guys like Van Persie and Sneijder wouldn't listen to me back then. Now they do."

His incredible start to the Bundesliga season back in September helped a lot. In three of his first five Bundesliga appearances he was Man of the Match. Before the trouble with his ankle he was the revelation of the German first division. "The way I play they don't see that often over there. And wingers are completely unknown, as they are in most leagues. Only in Holland and in brazil do you see such players."

He knows what he can add to the Dutch team. "Creativity. I can get round defender. But I'm not a regular yet, even though I always assumed I would be part of the team for South Africa."

The World Cup is the stage he was aiming for during therapy, for which he did all his power training. "And that's tough in Germany. I wasn't used to that. Now I am, just like I got used to these robust defenders they have there. Some really play to hurt you. The power and the endurance, it's all of a higher level here. ”

His first memory of the World Cup goes back to his childhood back in Surinam. "During the World Cup of 1994 I collected soda cans. With these cans you could win a golden ball. I remember that. But I didn't win anything. I also remember the game of Holland against Brazil vividly."