Daniel Taylor's match report
FULL TIME: England 1-2 Holland
Alli tries to magic something up with a burst into the Dutch box down the right, but runs the ball out of play. And that’s that. Or is it? A farcical end as Hodgson and Danny Blind shake hands on the touchline, only to realise the referee has added on another minute! But England can’t do anything with it. Holland have earned themselves the win with a fine comeback performance. A slight whiff of controversy about both of their goals, perhaps, but it’s only a friendly, and England can take comfort in their attacking play at least. Having said that, the high of Berlin only lasted approximately 70 hours. Ah well. Euro 2016, here they come! Something poor old Holland can’t say.
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90 min +2: Barkley dribbles down the right, but his cross into the England box is too long. A final substitution by Holland: the excellent Janssen is replaced by Clasie.
90 min +1: There will be three added minutes. Jagielka hoofs long for Vardy, but there’s no accuracy on the ball.
90 min: Van Aanholt robs a dithering Alli in the midfield. He makes it all the way to the England area, thinks about shooting, then turns back. Holland happy to keep the ball themselves for a bit. The clock is their friend.
88 min: England are seeing a lot of the ball, but in their own half. Holland are happy to let them have it, sitting deep and keeping their shape.
86 min: The attack-minded Van Aanholt’s cross from the left is deflected out by Jagielka for a Dutch corner. Memphis sends it straight down Forster’s throat.
85 min: Drinkwater’s debut is over. He’s replaced by Dier.
84 min: Kane bustles down the right channel, turns the occasionally hapless Blind, and lashes a fierce shot inches wide of the right-hand post. Zoet might have had that covered, but you wouldn’t put large amounts of cash on it. Kane really is a force of nature. A superstar in the making. One already, perhaps?
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82 min: To great cheers, the new golden boy Alli is sent on. The captain Milner departs, giving his armband to Jagielka. Perhaps it’ll help him with issues of balance. Holland make a change too, switching Willems for Van Aanholt.
81 min: Wembley is in a hot funk. A quiet seethe, rather than a rolling boil. It is only a friendly, after all.
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79 min: That was Bazoer’s last act of the evening. He’s replaced by Van Ginkel. England are livid about that second Dutch goal, suggesting Jagielka was unfairly sent crashing to the ground. It was a fierce shoulder charge all right, and you’ve seen fouls given for that. But the bottom line was, Jagielka was passive, while Janssen really wanted it. You can see why fortune favoured the brave.
GOAL! England 1-2 Holland (Narsingh 77)
Bazoer slides a ball down the inside-left channel for Janssen, who strongly shoulder-charges Jagielka off the ball and reaches the byline. He’s got time to look up and think. He pulls the ball back to Narsingh, coming in from the right. Narsingh batters the ball into the net, no fuss.
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76 min: Walker pulls Memphis back by the shoulder as the Manchester United winger threatens to break into a lot of space down the left. A free kick, which is looped into the England box to no effect.
74 min: This Zoet doesn’t mind coming off his line. He’s fond of making brave decisions. Walker makes good down the right and looks to be dropping a cross on Vardy’s head, 12 yards out. But the keeper races out to fingertip clear. A great last-ditch save. Vardy would have been powering that goalwards had the keeper not intervened.
73 min: It nearly gets it, thanks to that man Kane, who is released down the right by a clever slipped pass from Milner, and earns a corner. The set piece drops to his feet, ten yards out, just to the left of goal, but he can’t sort himself out quickly enough to get a shot off.
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72 min: Afellay is penalised for contesting a 50-50 with Barkley in the high-kickin’ style. A chance to load the box, but Milner’s free kick isn’t all that. This game needs a boost.
70 min: Another couple of changes by England: Kane and Jagielka come on for Lallana and Smalling.
69 min: Walcott chases after a long hoof down the middle. He enters the area, and falls to ground, having been gently clipped by Willems. He wants a penalty for that, but he’s not getting one. It would have been a generous decision.
67 min: A brilliant solo effort by Walcott who, tight on the right, spins suddenly and turns Willems with ease. He scampers off towards the box, then sends a rising effort inches over the bar. Zoet probably had that covered, and Lallana was offering himself in the middle, but Walcott was entitled to take that on himself, having carved the chance out of nothing. It wasn’t a bad effort at all.
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65 min: Holland calm it down a bit, passing it around the back for a while. That’s understandable enough, as England had worked up a small head of steam there.
63 min: Stones has been fairly hapless in defence tonight, but he certainly looks the business coming forward. He Beckenbauers his way upfield and slips a pass down the inside-right channel to release Walcott into the area. Walcott gets a shot away, though it’s blocked out for a corner by a last-ditch Blind challenge. Once again. Zoet plucks that from the sky. England look exciting going forward, not so clever at the back. Are we sure this is a Roy Hodgson side?
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61 min: Vardy has the ball, the best part of 30 yards from goal. He’s got nothing on, so decides to send a rising heatseeker towards the top right. It’s flying in, but fingertipped over the bar by Zoet, who then claims the resulting corner with ease. What a shot by Vardy, though, and a marvellous save to boot.
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59 min: England load the box. Milner floats the free kick in from the right, looking for Smalling just to the left of goal. But the delivery is a nonsense. England come again, though, with Lallana and Walcott causing bother down the left. The ball breaks inside for Clyne, who crashes a woeful volley several miles over the bar. That’ll have the roundel outside Wembley Park spinning on its pole.
58 min: Bruma is rightly booked for bringing down Vardy as the striker looks to break down the right. Before the free kick can be taken, Sturridge and Rose are substituted in favour of Walcott and Clyne.
56 min: England’s best form of defence is attack. They instigate a bit of head tennis in the Dutch area. Bruma eventually clears. Then Barkley glides down the left before whipping a deep cross in for Sturridge. Zoet is well off his line to claim.
54 min: England are beginning to look ropey at the back again. Forster is hounded by Memphis as he tries to kick clear. He only just about manages it. Soon after, Memphis is coming down the left wing and nearly finds Janssen ten yards out with a fine cross, but Drinkwater heads clear. Only to Bazoer, though, who shoots hard through a thicket of players from the edge of the box. Forster struggles to claim, the ball having taken a deflection off Drinkwater’s arm - no penalty for that one - but he smothers it eventually.
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53 min: Sturridge again troubles Blind down the right. He feeds Milner, who reaches the byline and stands one up towards Vardy at the far post. Vardy is preparing to but home, but Veltman rises to eyebrow it away from danger.
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GOAL! England 1-1 Holland (Janssen 51 pen)
Janssen clips it confidently into the top left, sending Forster the wrong way. A perfect penalty. On the England bench, Roy Hodgson is ranting like an alfresco beverage consumer. He is not happy.
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Penalty for Holland!
50 min: Stones faffs around once too often, slips, and he’s robbed by Janssen, who is one on one. He shoots towards the bottom right. Forster parries brilliantly. But much good the keeper’s heroics do for England. Narsingh picks up possession on the right, and crosses. Rose’s hand is dangling, and the ball strikes it. Penalty. Not all refs would give it, but you can see why this one has.
49 min: A Gazza-esque power dribble from the centre circle to the edge of the Dutch D by Barkley. He lays off to Lallana to his left. Lallana tries to curl one into the top right, but it’s high and wide.
47 min: Holland have come out on the front foot. Wijnaldum and Narsingh combine crisply down the right, but Rose and Stone combine to snuff them out. And then England respond through Sturridge, who takes possession of a throw from the right, spins Blind in the box, and fires towards the bottom-right corner. There’s no heat on the shot, which suits Zoet.
And we're off again!
Holland get the ball rolling for the second half. No changes. Yet. “If we win tonight I’ll be Breaking into Heaven, tomorrow Driving South to work it’ll be a Ten Storey Love Song before Daybreak and England, your Star Will Shine. But Vardy, please don’t shoot Straight To The Man, I’m Begging You to hit the net, we’re walking a Tightrope here. Gimme some Good Times and fewer Tears. Oh How Do You Sleep knowing you could make so many people happy and watch how Love Spreads.” Howard Appleby there, track by track and in the right order. Led Zeppelin III has an awful lot to answer for.
Half-time entertainment of an international flavour: Just in case you missed it over Easter weekend, here’s the story of the great Bjarni Fel, the man who introduced top-quality football to generations of Icelandic fans. If Iceland do a Denmark or Greece this summer, you’ll know who to thank.
HALF TIME: England 1-0 Holland
The free kick comes to nothing, headed clear with ease by Walker, and that’s that for the opening 45. Jamie Vardy’s second international goal is the difference. Make sure you stay for the second half. No flipping, as another recently departed legend once said.
45 min: Milner needlessly controls the ball with his arm in the midfield. That’s a free kick, and a chance for Holland to pack the box and cause some bother in the one minute that’ll be added onto the end of this half.
43 min: That goal came out of nowhere. Up to that point, both teams were lucky to have nil.
WHAT A LOVELY TEAM GOAL! England 1-0 Holland (Vardy 41)
This is a brilliant move. Stones sends Milner away down the left. He slides a pass across the front of the box. Sturridge shapes to shoot but dummies for Lallana, who feeds the ball down the inside-right channel for Walker, steaming in. Walker could shoot from a tight angle - he is one on one with Zoet after all - but he slips an unselfish pass to his left for Vardy to powerfully sidefoot home from ten yards. That was very easy on the eye. Johan Cruyff would have approved.
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38 min: Promes can’t continue. He’s replaced by Manchester United botherer Luciano Narsingh. After the restart, Barkley picks up pace down the inside-right channel and sends a low curling screamer inches wide of the right-hand post. Not sure Zoet was getting to that had it been on target.
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36 min: Quite a lot of pointless noodling right now. It’s like the second half of Second Coming. “I know we’re playing Holland, and the recognition to Johan Cruyff is well-deserved, but does England have to play like a Louis Van Gaal tribute band?” wonders Hubert O’Hearn. “I miss the Spurs players that gave us so much life in Berlin.”
33 min: ... the ball drops to Stones on the edge of the box. This time, up the other end of the pitch, he does put his foot through it. His shot is spearing towards the bottom right, and it’d have gone in were it not for Janssen, guarding the line and hacking away. Much better from England!
32 min: Rose is beginning to look busy down the left. He exchanges passes with Lallana and then Milner, before reaching the byline and pulling back for Sturridge, whose first-time shot is deflected to the right wing. Barkley earns a corner with a lovely jink down the line. And from that ...
30 min: Afellay scampers after a long ball down the left, and gets there ahead of Walker, but his low cross, looking for Memphis, is weak and straight at Stones. The ball-playing defender faffs around in the grand style, and is nearly closed down by Wijnaldum, but eventually clears his lines. Put your foot through it, man! Can anybody spot the influence of Bobby Martinez?
28 min: Rose powers down the left, and one-twos with Vardy to make ground. He then returns the ball to Vardy, on the edge of the area. The striker takes a touch to enter the Dutch area, but slashes across the ball and sends it sailing harmlessly over the bar, wide left to boot. But that’s better from England, who have been very clumpish in attack so far. A much-needed injection of pace and determination.
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26 min: Lallana should clear a simple ball down the Dutch left, but slides towards the ball in the half-arsed fashion. He allows Wijnaldum to stride down the channel and curl one towards the top right. Forster, at full stretch, palms round for a corner. There’s a mild kerfuffle at the set piece, and for a second it looks like the ball might fall to Janssen on the penalty spot, but Smalling blooters clear with extreme prejudice, and the danger is over.
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23 min: Lallana tries to find Rose down the left with one of the most ambitious backflicks of all time. Rose really has to put the jets on to reach it, but Veltman is never going to be beaten, and guides the ball out of play. This match has turned a little turgid, and the Wembley crowd have fallen quiet. You know something’s wrong when you’re pleased to hear a little injection of atmosphere from that effing brass band.
21 min: Promes is down, having twisted his knee. It looks as though he’ll be OK to continue, but it’s another frustrating stop to a game which keeps threatening to burst into life, but never quite manages it.
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18 min: Drinkwater, wide on the left, attempts to release his Leicester team-mate Vardy on the right with a raking diagonal pass. It’s one of those Hollywood efforts, straight into the stand. “I think the point is that youthful, positive, exciting and attractive England just Wanna be Adored. Or possibly that half of their back four just wanna be a forward, I’m not sure.” Robin Hazelhurst there, honking away like Ian Brown at Reading ‘96.
16 min: A burst of pace down the right, of great promise by Promes, and Rose, slightly dozy so far tonight, is left behind. Promes feeds the ball inside for Janssen, who looks for the bottom left from a central position, 20 yards out. Forster is behind it all the way. A nice, flowing move by the Dutch.
14 min: Wembley rises as one to applaud the memory of the greatest Dutchman of all, that famous No14, Johan Cruyff. He was a magnificently contrary chap, so what better way to remember him ourselves by recalling his scoring of the world’s only Total Own Goal (1m 01s here). As you’d expect, it’s a thing of absurd beauty, the ball chested down and sent sailing serenely into the top corner with one insouciant flick of the boot. The greatest mistake ever? Yes. There’s a good chance he was secretly pleased with it. Damn, he’ll be missed.
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13 min: A lot of midfield faffing. This game could do with a genius. Speaking of which ...
11 min: A long throw from the Dutch left, and Memphis is latching onto a loose ball on the left-hand corner of the England area. He turns and whips a shot over the crossbar. It was never troubling Forster, but England are asking for trouble if they keep sleepwalking around at the back like this. Milner was in another world.
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9 min: Sturridge stays down for over a minute. Liverpool fans cool your boots, for the man is only fixing his. But there goes all that early end-to-end momentum! Tum-te-tum. “The sight of Stones, Rose gives the England line-up a touch of Manchester ‘89,” opines the top and bangin’ Shane Meadows Peter Oh. “It’ll be interesting to see tonight if the impressive performance against Germany was the real thing, or Fools Gold.”
7 min: Sturridge strokes a ball down the right for the livewire Vardy to chase. For a second, it looks like Vardy will win a footrace with Bruma. He’d have been one on one with the keeper Zoet if he did, but Bruma slides in to nip the ball away for a corner. The set piece comes to naught. It’s got a nice, open feel, this game.
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6 min: Veltman drops a shoulder and zips past Rose on the right. He enters the box. Rose, trying to make good his mistake, slides in and catches his man, who goes down. The ball flies out of play, and the referee points for a goal kick. England got away with one there.
4 min: Smalling plays a hospital ball back to Forster, who in a panic can only hack upfield 20 yards or so. Drinkwater’s first act as an international footballer is to concede a foul, with Memphis threatening to pick up the loose ball and make off towards the box. The resulting set piece comes to nothing, but that’s a nervous start at the back for England.
3 min: Milner, the captain tonight, whips the ball set piece straight out of play. The only way is up.
2 min: Vardy turns on the jets to zip into space down the right. He earns a corner.
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And we're off!
After an immaculately observed moment’s silence, England get the ball rolling. A large cheer of relief, and we’re underway. It’s not long before Rose tries to burst down the left wing, but he runs out of space quickly enough and the ball balloons out of play.
The teams are out! England are wearing their famous white shirts, while the Oranje are playing in second-choice blue. No, me neither. Both sets of players are wearing black armbands in honour of Cruyff, and there will be a minute’s silence for the victims of the recent terrorist atrocities in Brussels and Lahore. Pink ribbons are also on display in awareness of Breast Cancer Care. There’s respect for both national anthems, with Wembley understandably pensive.
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Speaking of that famous 4-1 ... The story of that glorious day at Wembley is told here by the fabulous Michael Gibbons. His book When Football Came Home: England, the English and Euro 96 is certain to induce a Proustian rush in anyone aged 35 or over. A must-read.
The Dutch aren’t in the best nick. They lost 3-2 at home to France last Friday, on an emotional night in Amsterdam overshadowed by the death of Cruyff. That was their fourth loss in six matches this season, and their fifth in the last year, a run which includes defeats by the USA, Iceland, Turkey and the Czech Republic. They’ve shipped eight goals in their last three matches, and all they’ve got to look forward to this summer is a series of friendlies in early June, helping other countries prepare for Euro 2016. The Oranje are, of course, not going.
On the flip side, Holland have lost just one of their last 12 matches against England, that famous 4-1 tonking at Euro 96. They’re undefeated in six, and last time they came here, in February 2012, they ran out 3-2 winners. So goodness knows how confident they’ll feel tonight. It’s going to be fun finding out.
The teams
England: Forster, Walker, Smalling, Stones, Rose, Milner, Drinkwater, Vardy, Barkley, Lallana, Sturridge.
Subs: Clyne, Heaton, Walcott, Cahill, Jagielka, Henderson, Dier, Kane, Alli, Welbeck.
Holland: Zoet, Veltman, Bruma, Blind, Willems, Wijnaldum, Bazoer, Afellay, Depay, Janssen, Promes.
Subs: Vermeer, Karsdorp, van Dijk, Van Aanholt, Clasie, Narsingh, van Ginkel, Huntelaar, de Jong, Letschert, Vorm.
Referee: Antonio Miguel Mateu Lahoz (Spain).
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Eight lions. Leicester midfielder Danny Drinkwater will win his first England cap at the age of 26 tonight, as Roy Hodgson makes eight changes to the team that saw off Transitional German Collective at the weekend. Daniel Sturridge returns to international football after a gap of 573 days, and will be captained by his Liverpool team-mate James Milner. Fraser Forster of Southampton starts in goal, Joe Hart and then Jack Butland having succumbed to injury. Kyle Walker of Spurs, John Stones and Ross Barkley of Everton, and Leicester City whirling dervish Jamie Vardy also start.
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Style guide:
GEORGE: What is Holland?
JERRY: What do you mean, ‘what is it?’ It’s a country right next to Belgium.
GEORGE: No, that’s the Netherlands.
JERRY: Holland is the Netherlands.
GEORGE: Then who are the Dutch?
According to the Guardian style guide, Holland “should not be used to mean the Netherlands (of which it is a region), with the exception of the Dutch football team, who are conventionally known as Holland”. So there you have it. Hup Holland Hup!
Good evening!
Germany 2, England 3. Well, that went better than expected, didn’t it.
On to the Netherlands, then. A country still reeling from the death of their greatest star, Johan Cryuff. who passed away last week. Cruyff faced England three times. He was one of Holland’s better players in a 0-1 home defeat against the reigning world champions in November 1969. He was fairly anonymous in a dismal 0-0 draw at Wembley three months later, though our man Albert Barham noted that “the Dutch passing was far superior to that of England”, a harbinger of things to come. So far, so humdrum. But then there was February 1977 at Wembley.
“Not since the visit of the Hungarians in 1953 have England been so utterly demoralised in front of their own supporters by the skill of the opposition.” The pen of the legendary David Lacey, there, putting Don Revie’s desperate England to the sword after Holland routed them 2-0. “Their two previous defeats at Wembley had been under the managership of Sir Alf Ramsey, and each was regarded as a calamitous example of the decline since 1970, West Germany winning decisively in the European championship in 1972, Italy adding insult to the injury of being eliminated from the World Cup by Poland in 1973. But neither of these defeats was suffered so helplessly as last night’s result.
“It was as if all the lessons of the last six or seven years had been rolled into a 90-minute summary so that the English could enjoy a spot of revision or could check their facts if they had not heard properly the first time.” Ouch. Ooyah. Oof. “In passing, positioning and shooting, covering, intercepting and tackling, Holland were so superior that long before the end it was clear that if one country had invented the game, the other had developed it into, so far as England were concerned, an unrecognisable art.”
Cruyff was the architect of England’s downfall, having taken a “leisurely, almost amused view of England’s predictable, one-paced approach”. After 30 minutes, “from his favourite position on the Dutch left, he toyed with the ball as Mike Doyle stood off him, then fed it sharply through to Johan Neeskens who emerged suddenly in the midst of the England defence. Jan Peters, with plenty of room, accepted a pass and beat Ray Clemence matter-of-factly. Eight minutes later, Cruyff slipped the ball forward to Hugo Hovenkamp ... Peters again had room on the right and this time he turned inside Kevin Beattie before scoring.
“Having made their point, the Dutch held off for much of the second half, although they always looked like scoring more goals with Cruyff continuing to do much as he liked on the left. It was rather like watching an expert swordsman casually sweep aside the novice’s cover, then let him off rapier at chest.” Lacey there, a master at work himself. Although he wasn’t the only man to wax lyrical about Cruyff that evening. Here’s the Dutch manager Jan Zwartkruis: “Cruyff was brilliant tonight. He was like the Scarlet Pimpernel. You saw him here, you saw him there, you saw him everywhere.” He only played three more times for his country before retiring ahead of the 1978 World Cup. Damned elusive, huh.
Anyway, the modern Netherlands have played eight games in the last year, losing five of them. England meanwhile have their dander up after beating the world champions. How times change. Kick off at Wembley is at 8pm. It’s on!
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