Valentijn Driessen is critical of Ruud van Nistelrooij’s substitution policy during PSV’s 3-0 defeat against SC Cambuur last Saturday. The Eindhoven team fell behind in the second company in Leeuwarden due to a goal by Sylvester van der Water, after which Van Nistelrooij chose to get some strong players to the side. “Then you wonder if the trainer is there with his head. I had my big doubts about that on Saturday evening,” said Driessen.
“We have seen an apathetic PSV”, says Driessen in front of the camera of The Telegraph. “There was nothing in it at all. No pressure forward and no one wanting to claim the game for themselves. No one to take the plow by the hand. Ruud van Nistelrooij also had a few incomprehensible substitutions. At one point they went through the row of switches on television and then I saw Xavi Simons, Ibrahim Sangaré and Joey Veerman.”
Driessen cannot understand why Van Nistelrooij switched just this threesome. “These are all players who can possibly score a goal or who know what it is like to go into the last ten or fifteen minutes with a 1-0 deficit and who have the experience to possibly straighten things out. But he chose all Jong PSV players from last season. Then you wonder if the trainer is there with his head. I had my big doubts about that on Saturday evening,” said Driessen.
PSV watcher Rik Elfrink previously criticized Van Nistelrooij’s substitution policy against Cambuur. According to Elfrink, Xavi Simons was still reasonably in the game when he was substituted for Yorbe Vertessen after an hour of play and the substitute attacker is mainly a striker who can be brought to a lead. “You would expect Vertessen with a 1-0 lead,” said Elfrink. “Guus Til played very weakly and was perhaps the weakest technically. At the end of the game, PSV also had a lot of lightweights on the field. You have to be able to play fighting football at that moment.”
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