Virgil van Dijk is satisfied with what the Dutch national team showed on Wednesday when visiting Italy in the Nations League. According to the captain, the good performance in Bergamo was largely due to national coach Frank de Boer.
De Boer stepped down from the usual 4-3-3 line-up and opted for a 5-3-2 formation. In this way he wanted to prevent the Netherlands from being surprised again by the attacking game of Italy, as was the case last month during the first game in Amsterdam, when they lost 0-1.
“The trainer has handled it well,” said Van Dijk to the WE. “All credits to him. We have trained well on this for the past two days. We knew it had to be different than in the previous meeting with the Italians, because we were not involved then.”
“Today we delivered a good performance that we can build on in the next international period. We were well organized and worked very hard. We could have played it a few times better on the counter in the second half.”
‘The grumpiness mainly came from outside’
De Boer could also use a success, because he had a bad first week as national coach. The Netherlands lost the exhibition game against Mexico (0-1) on Wednesday and did not get further than a draw in the Nations League game against Bosnia and Herzegovina (0-0) on Sunday, which increased the criticism.
“The grumpiness mainly came from outside,” said Van Dijk. “That may also make sense, because we have set a certain expectations. We reached the final of the Nations League, it all went well, but there may be a lesser pot in between.”
“Everyone may be critical. be able to achieve success. “
View the results, the program and the standings in the Nations League
– .
/nginx/o/2020/10/13/13410512t1h7b81.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1)
