iSporter Akshay Iyer analyses the quarter final game of the FIFA World Cup between Brazil and Netherlands which the Dutch won 2-1 after staging an amazing comeback.
Brazil vs Netherlands is a fixture that usually guarantees a display of "Total and Beautiful Football". And, while the quarter-finals meeting between these two football superpowers may not have lived up its pre-match hype; the Netherlands did just enough to win and book their place in the semi-finals of the 2010 World Cup.
Coming in to the match, Brazil had the edge over the Netherlands even though the latter hadn't lost a match in the tournament. The Netherlands coach Bert Van Marwijk was forced to make a late change to his starting line-up when first-choice centre back Joris Mathijsen sustained an injury just before the kick-off. Van Marwijk replaced Mathijsen with Andre Ooijer, and this late change eventually led to the first goal of the match.
Ooijer failed to mark Robinho who easily picked up a pass and fired his shot past a hapless Maarten Stekelenburg to give Brazil the lead inside the first 10 minutes. Robinho had scored a couple of minutes earlier too, but the Brazilian striker was ruled offside by the assistant referee.
Brazil kept the pressure on the Dutch for the rest of the half, but failed to extend their lead and the two teams went in to the half-time with the Samba boys in the lead and looking all set to enter the semi-finals. The beauty of sports, however, is that it can change at any moment.
That moment in this match came in the 53rd minute when a harmless Wesley Sneijder cross took a deflection off Felipe Melo to allow a Dutch renaissance. Brazilian goal keeper Julio Cesar is one of the top 'keepers in the world, but his ill-timed decision to rush from his line and mistimed jump were as much to blame for the Netherlands' equaliser.
Sneijder, who has been one of the Netherlands' shining lights in this World Cup, was in the thick of action again in the 68th minute as he scored the winning goal from a flick on by Dirk Kuyt after an Arjen Robben corner. This goal seemed to snuff out the fight from the Brazilians, and the Dutch did their part in ensuring that the match wouldn't head in to extra time. Any hope Brazil had of staging a fight back ended in the 73rd minute when Melo was shown the red card for stomping on Robben after hacking him from behind.
There is no excuse for Melo's antics - they were unwarranted and unsportsmanlike. But, Robben himself didn't cover himself with glory in this match. With the ball, Robben is a magician, but whenever a Brazilian player approached or tackled him, the Dutch star fell to the ground and rolled around as though he had been shot or savagely punched!
In the final analysis though, Netherlands won 2-1 to book their berth in the semi-finals were they will play Uruguay who defeated Ghana in a shoot-out. While it may be too early to make this call, the Dutch will fancy their chances of making their third World Cup final.
As for the Brazil, this was the second consecutive World Cup where the five-time champions crashed out at the quarter-finals stage. Brazilian coach Dunga announced his resignation immediately after the match and some of his decisions are bound to be questioned back home. Dunga's decision to field three midfielders - Melo, Gilberto and Dani Alves - in the starting line-up against Netherlands could be considered defensive by more than a few Brazilians.
In Dunga's defence though, as in previous matches, he would have expected his fullback duo of Maicon and Michel Bastos to support Kaka, Robinho and Luis Fabiano in breaking the Dutch defence. This didn't happen though because of some smart tactical thinking by Van Marwijk who used Kuyt on the left side of midfield to mark and check Maicon.
Kuyt did his job brilliantly running the length of the pitch as he frustrated Maicon time and time again. As for Bastos, he found the task of marking Robben too much to handle, and with the Dutch star moving forward time and time again, the Brazilian fullback hardly had any opportunities to make attacking runs.
Ooijer and his centre-back colleague John Hetinga made up for their early lapse which allowed Brazil to take the lead and quickly settled in to their role and stopped Luis Fabiano from being a factor in the match. Nigel De Jong and Mark Van Bommel also played their part to perfection as they closed down Kaka and prevented him from making his terrific passes which allow Fabiano to cut through the opposition defence.
A major reason for Brazil's defeat was also Kaka's lack of form. Kaka, who is jus returning from injury, wasn't at his best and in the biggest stage of them all, the fact that the Real Madrid star failed to score a goal didn't help Brazil's cause either.
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