Maarten Wijffels understands why Daley Blind is still an international for the Dutch national team. According to the Dutch watcher at Girona, the now 33-year-old defender shows every week that he can handle the top level. With Blind on the left of a three-man defense, the Spanish club has climbed to first place in LaLiga.
Wijffels goes into the AD Football podcast addresses the question of how the selection of people in their thirties works at Oranje. “That depends. Daley Blind is a wonderful example of someone who the community thought about six months ago: Get rid of it! Why are you still drafting him, why is he there?“
“But let’s just say it like it is. He plays for the leaders in LaLiga and they play great football. And he simply plays a leading role there,” Wijffels compliments Blind. “He is always there, centrally at the back. I watch those matches and I sometimes see him go forward. He recently provided the front assist for the winning goal in the ninetieth minute.”
“That trainer (Míchel, ed.) recently told him: ‘Listen, I have a football team and I need someone who takes care of the passing from the back. And who takes other players with him in setting up’. Yes, and Blind does that. really fine. There is currently no reason to let him lose weight in his thirties.”
Maarten Wijffels understands why Daley Blind is still with the Dutch team.
With 103 international matches, Blind is by far the most experienced international in the current selection of the Dutch national team, with captain Virgil van Dijk (62 international matches) as number two at an appropriate distance. Blind did not have a starting place in the last two international matches for the Dutch team and Koeman did not use him as a substitute.
De Roon
While Wijffels is positive about Blind, the journalist has a different opinion about the now 32-year-old Marten de Roon. “I think it may be more difficult for him, because the competition in midfield is really fierce. But if you are talking about a kind of leader of the substitutes. People can laugh about that, but during a tournament you also have We need someone who ensures that the substitutes also train fully every day.”
“And Kevin Strootman had that naturally. He simply conducted the training the day after an international match. Is De Roon someone who could do that, or do you put that up to Blind? Yes, that all remains to be seen,” Wijffels is curious about what everything will happen at Oranje in the coming months.
“If you also see the thirty-somethings, yes, Weghorst. That is also a bit of the question, what do you do with them? Suppose Luuk de Jong returns, then I think one of those two thirty-somethings will not go to the European Championship. And Virgil van Dijk, the captain, is also over thirty. But that is the captain, he will certainly come along,” said the Oranje follower.