Frenkie de Jong played against Norway on Wednesday evening as a controlling midfielder, where he has a slightly more attacking role at his club Barcelona. The the Dutch international let it be known after the 1-1 draw that he feels good in his role just before the defense, with Davy Klaassen and Georginio Wijnaldum as colleagues in midfield. In his other role, he gets more on the ball, which he sees as a plus.
Klaassen and Wijnaldum played more advanced against Norway than De Jong. The ex-Ajacied was much sought after in the build-up and regularly let himself down between the defenders. “I touched the ball a lot and I love that,” De Jong responded in conversation with the NOS on his role in his 32nd international match for the Dutch. “Sometimes I had to fill it in differently. Especially when they play with two strikers, I can’t get too close to the ball. Otherwise, the rest defense will not go well. So I played a little more reserved.” De Jong had 130 ball contacts in 90 minutes. He noted a passing accuracy of 95 percent.
Although De Jong is happy with his role, he said he was in front of the camera with a disappointed feeling because of the loss of points. “We are a bit lucky that Turkey draws, so it is still in our own hands. I do think we need to do better,” said De Jong. “I think we created far too few chances. We don’t do enough on the ball, I think I can do more in that myself. I had a lot of the ball and had to do more with it. We had a hard time creating chances. It’s not good enough when you get the ball that much.”
According to Van Gaal, the fact that the Dutch had difficulty creating opportunities had to do with carelessness at the ball. “I definitely think we were sloppy,” De Jong agrees with the trainer. “I think sometimes we don’t make the right choices. You sometimes have a day when it doesn’t work out, then it’s good that you don’t lose in any case. You did have some kind of control, but not enough. With the track record of the Dutch national team and the quality we have, we just have to always win.” The Netherlands continues the World Cup qualification on Saturday evening (8:45 p.m.) with a match against Montenegro in the Philips Stadium.