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Holland
Dutch Debutants Frustrate Football Ferns
by Jeremy Ruane
FIFA Women's World Cup Finals debutants Holland frustrated a dominant Football Ferns team at Edmonton's Commonwealth Stadium on June 6, edging the Oceania champions 1-0 in a match which saw Tony Readings' charges on top everywhere but on the scoreboard.
New Zealand bossed all the possession, territory and set-piece statistics in their opening match at Canada 2015, but it was their less experienced - in Women's World Cup Finals terms - opponents who had the scoreboard in their favour come the final whistle, thanks to Lieke Martens' curling twenty-five yarder struck twelve minutes before half-time.
There was little between the teams in the opening ten minutes, until a moment of magic from Annalie Longo changed the pattern of play. She managed to control a lofted ball and turn between two opponents virtually simultaneously, in doing so engineering the space to unleash a twenty-five yarder which Loes Geurts saved well to her right.
The Dutch response was instant, with Erin Nayler called upon to keep out a long-range effort from Martens before Danielle Van de Donk had a goal ruled out by the offside flag in the thirteenth minute.
Seconds later, Desiree Van Lunteren pinged a ball forward which saw Dutch striker Vivianne Miedema outpace Rebekah Stott. Much to the defender's relief, Nayler was alert to the danger, and raced out of her penalty area to avert the danger with a hefty clearance.
The Kiwis were already beginning to clock up the set-piece plays, and one of them, a Ria Percival free-kick in the twentieth minute, saw Geurts somewhat relieved as she pawed the sphere to safety from beneath her crossbar.
After Stefanie Van der Gragt had directed a glancing header across goal following a corner taken by Dutch captain and set-piece technician Mandy Van den Berg, a Percival corner was flicked on by Abby Erceg to Stott, who drove the ball back into the danger zone. Hannah Wilkinson clattered into Geurts as she grabbed the ball, prompting Mexican referee Quetzalli Alvarado to award a free-kick rather than a goal, the ball having ended up in the net.
Miedema's charging runs were a feature of Holland's play, and from another such surge on the half-hour, in pursuit of a lobbed ball forward by Van de Donk, Nayler had to dash out to save at the striker's feet.
When the Dutch next raided, it proved to be the game's decisive moment. Malon Melis - a handful at the best of times - secured possession on the right and worked the ball inside to Miedema, who switched play to Martens, in space on the left flank. She cut inside and unleashed a curling twenty-five yarder which swerved round the diving figure of Nayler and found the far corner of the net.
Holland's one-goal advantage instantly came under threat, with the Football Ferns denied a dead-set penalty just five minutes later. Amber Hearn ran her heart out as the first line of defence on this, her one hundredth appearance for the Football Ferns, and on this occasion, her pursuit of seemingly lost causes bore fruit.
She charged down a clearance, then enjoyed the benefit of a wickedly back-spinning ball to find herself inside the penalty area, albeit with her back to goal. Two seconds later, she was afforded a close-up view of the artificial turf, having been brought down from behind by Van der Gragt. Remarkably, referee Alvarado saw no offence, and play continued.
Seconds later, a teasing cross-shot from Wilkinson was heading for the top near corner when Geurts rose, then promptly spilled the ball. She swiftly gathered it before the incoming figure of Sarah Gregorius could swoop on the rebound.
The second half was one-way traffic, with the Football Ferns all but setting up camp inside the Dutch half of the field. But try as they might, they just couldn't get the breakthrough they needed, and thoroughly deserved.
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Percival was the busiest player on the park, taking free-kicks and corners galore as the black-clad Kiwi team sought an equaliser via every means possible. There was one free-kick she didn't take, however, having copped a size six in the face from Martens in the 64th minute which earned a yellow card for FIFA's Player of the Match - clearly the practice of "Fair Play" didn't come into the decision-making process on this occasion.
Tellingly, however, for all their possession and set-piece activity, it wasn't until twelve minutes from time that Geurts was forced into making a save in the second half, a comfortable denial of substitute Betsy Hassett's long-range effort.
Seconds later, Longo and Hearn linked up with another replacement, Jasmine Pereira. Her cross sought out the head of Wilkinson, but Van der Gragt anticipated the danger and headed clear.
With seven minutes remaining, Hassett played in Wilkinson, who went down inside the area under another challenge from Van der Gragt. A penalty, surely. Not in the eyes of referee Alvarado, whose overall performance can most kindly be described as ordinary at best.
As New Zealand pressed for an equaliser in the later stages of the match, they were vulnerable to being caught on the counter-attack, and in the 89th minute, Nayler was forced to make her only save of the half to deny a rare Dutch raid, substitute Tessal Middag giving the otherwise unoccupied 'keeper something to do after Van de Donk and Melis had combined to good effect.
Sadly for the Football Ferns, there was to be no dramatic leveller in stoppage time to reward their efforts, much to the disappointment of coach Tony Readings. "That was frustrating. It would be a big worry if we weren't creating chances, but we are. It's just the execution of those chances which needs to improve.
"We've got the players with the right quality, as we showed in the second half in particular. We challenged the team to step up, and they did - more pace, more aggression. When we play as we can, we can outplay most teams.
"Today our set-piece opportunities were outstanding, and we could have had a penalty or two as well. But we need to score to win, and unfortunately we didn't".
Captain Abby Erceg was similarly irked by the lack of reward for her team's efforts. "I've said previously that you can't have that much possession in a game and not do something with it.
"It's been an improvement on previous Finals, where we've usually been defending for the majority of matches, but we've come here to be a threat and get out of our group, so we'll go away and work on that.
"We'll be looking at ways on capitalising on our possession. Obviously that's a challenge to our strikers. We also let in a little bit of a soft goal, which could have been prevented, and if anything come away with a point, so we do have to take some learning points from this match, both offensively and defensively.
"Canada on Thursday here in Edmonton will be a big challenge, and we've made it a little more difficult for ourselves, going into the match with no points on the board. In saying that, we have to move on from today's game as quickly as possible and focus on Canada, and look at coming away with three points from that game".
The clash with the host nation takes place at 1pm on Friday, NZ time, at Edmonton's Commonwealth Stadium.
Holland: Geurts; Van Lunteren, Van der Gragt, Van den Berg, Hogewoning; Spitse, Van de Donk (booked, 32), Dekker (Middag, 84); Melis, Miedema (Van de Sanden, 81), Martens (booked, 64) (Van de Ven, 90)
F'ball Ferns: Nayler; Percival, Stott, Erceg, Riley; Bowen (Hassett, 71), Duncan, Hearn, Longo; Wilkinson, Gregorius (Pereira, 67)
Referee: Quetzalli Alvarado (Mexico)
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