World Cup preview: Netherlands
The most successful nation to never win a World Cup is back after failing to qualify in 2018
Previous World Cup appearances: 1934, 1938, 1974, 1978, 1990, 1994, 1998, 2006, 2010, 2014
Best finish: Runner-up (1974, 1978, 2010)
Group stage schedule: vs. Senegal (Nov. 21), vs. Ecuador (Nov. 25), vs. Qatar (Nov. 29)
Note: All stats accurate as of the end of the 2021-22 European season.
The breakdown
How they qualified: The Netherlands finished atop a qualification group featuring Turkey, Norway, Montenegro, Latvia and Gibraltar with seven wins, two draws and a loss. They opened with a 4-2 defeat to Turkey on the road and didn’t lose again. England, Germany and Denmark were the only countries with a better goal difference during UEFA qualifying than the Dutch, who scored 33 goals and conceded eight.
Names to know:
Frenkie de Jong (Barcelona) — De Jong arrived at Barcelona in 2019 as one of the most promising young players in the world after playing an integral role in Ajax’s run to the Champions League semifinals. He ranked in the 96th percentile in long pass completion percentage (83.7%) and in the 92nd percentile in live-ball shot-creating actions (2.45 per 90 minutes) among midfielders in the major European leagues this past season1.
Memphis Depay (Barcelona) — Depay netted the same number of goals (12) for his country in 10 appearances during qualifying than he did in 28 La Liga games for Barcelona. The 28-year-old contributed six assists as well and was directly involved in multiple goals in half of the team’s qualifiers. He is 12 goals away from becoming the Netherlands’ all-time leading goal scorer2.
Davy Klaassen (Ajax) — Outside of Depay, Klaassen was the most productive player in qualifying with four goals and four assists. He’s tallied double-figure league goals with Ajax four different times and ended this season with nine3. Klassen’s ability to get on the scoresheet from the midfield is crucial to help offset the team’s lack of a pure, reliable center forward.
Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool) — Liverpool have played in the Champions League final or won the Premier League every season van Dijk’s been healthy since he joined from Southampton in January 2018. He did not make his national team debut until 2015 and missed last summer’s European Championships through injury, meaning this is the first chance for the world’s best center back to play in a major international tournament.
Georginio Wijnaldum (Roma) — Wijnaldum is one of the few holdovers from the team that came in third at the 2014 World Cup. He won the Champions League and Premier League with van Dijk at Liverpool before leaving for PSG last summer. The 31-year-old has 86 caps and 26 goals for the Netherlands but was dropped for the June international window after a rough first season in Paris4. He is spending the 2022-23 season on loan at Roma.
Note: Wijnaldum will miss the tournament through injury.
Potential breakout star: Ryan Gravenberch (Bayern Munich)
Gravenberch — who turned 20 in May — already has 72 Eredivisie appearances to his name. He saw the field at the European Championships last summer, playing the full 90 minutes against North Macedonia. Though he is an established name at the club level and joined Bayern Munich over the summer, Gravenberch’s yet to leave his mark on the international game. He will have a chance to do so in Qatar, especially if Wijnaldum’s poor form continues.
Note: Gravenberch was left out of the Dutch World Cup squad.
The bottom line
Reason for optimism: The timing is perfect
All 11 guys who played more than 450 minutes in qualifying are between the ages of 22 and 32. Four of those players have World Cup experience. Last summer’s Euros gave other key players a taste of what major tournaments feel like. Van Dijk is healthy. This World Cup could not have come at a better time for the Dutch.
Biggest question: What did they learn from the Euros?
After missing back-to-back major tournaments, the Netherlands won all three group stage games at the Euros before crashing out in the round of 16. Frank de Boer was relieved of his managerial duties two days later. Getting out of the group wasn’t good enough then, and it won’t be good enough in Qatar either.
Here’s the deal:
Louis van Gaal is back in charge and the group is not a brutal one. They’ve reached the semifinals of the last two World Cups they’ve participated in. The talent is there to do it again. If this group can’t make a deep run in a tournament now, it’s fair to wonder if they ever will.