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Holland want six points
Maarten Wijffels
AD
Saturday 11 October 2008
The national football team of the
Netherlands want six points from the World
Cup qualifiers against Iceland and Norway.
A maximum score will ease all minds
until Holland play again in the spring of 2009.
Manager Bert van Marwijk would
have liked to play a sharp game of 11 against 11 during
the last training session.
But due to all the injuries that
wasn't possible.
But he could live with the compromise
that enrolled on the training ground of Quick Boys in
Katwijk.
The core of the starters sparred
with a team of subs and staff members and within 12
minutes netted 7 goals.
And that is always good for confidence,
Van Marwijk said before the team got on the boss to
drive back to the hotel.
And goals is what Holland need
when they face Iceland tonight.
The manager and his players want
six points from the next two encounters just so that
there is peace until the spring of next year.
Holland are in a group of only
five teams, which means that there are no games scheduled
in the next international weekend in November.
After the game in Norway on Wednesday
it will be 5½ months before they play again,
when the Netherlands resume their qualification campaign
with games against Scotland (28 March) and Macedonia
(1 April).
When these two games in front of
a home crowd bring victories as well than the tickets
for the World Cup finals in South Africa are in the
pocket.
After that there are the home game
against Norway and an away game to Iceland.
Without calamities the away game
in Scotland (September 2009) should be irrelevant by
that time.
Looking at things in this wider
perspective one can understand why Bert van Marwijk
went through all this trouble to convince Edwin van
der Sar to help out the team for these two games.
The same thing goes for his talks
with the management of Real Madrid that resulted in
Wesley Sneijder training with the team this week and
him being on the bench tonight.
Van Marwijk will only disclose
his lineup
to the group this morning, but the last training gave
a good indication.
He tried Dirk Marcellis and Jan
Kromkamp on the right back position, Ibrahim Afellay
and Dirk on the right wing and Klaas-Jan Huntelaar and
Dirk Kuyt as center forwards.
Van Marwijk knows that Kuyt is
full of good spirit after having scored a couple of
decisive goals fro Liverpool in recent weeks, so Dirk
Marcellis got the most attention from the staff.
It seems likely the PSV-defender
will start tonight, making him the first player to make
his debut under Bert van Marwijk.
Against Iceland, number 103 on
the FIFA-ranking, Holland should in theory gain an easy
victory.
With Eidur
Gudjohnsen they bring only one top player to De
Kuip.
The former PSV forward will be
supported by a number of players from the English Premier
League.
Among them is Gretar
Steinsson, who used to kick for AZ.
Yet the starting lineup also contains
players from the domestic league.
The man of coach Olafur Johannesson
gained eight points during their last campaign for Euro
2008.
They twice beat Northern Ireland,
drew once with Liechtenstein and held Spain to an impressive
1-1 in Reykjavik.
They only lost 1-0 in Spain.
Against Sweden, the other top side
in their group they lost twice, with the 5-0 defeat
in Sweden being the ultimate low.
Where the Dutch camp was primarily
occupied with football the Icelandic preparations were
overshadowed by the credit crisis that hit the island
hard.
"We want to focus on the game,
but we are constantly being reminded of what is going
on at home. The country is in dire straits," says
Gretar Steinsson.
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