Hans Kraay junior considers Kenneth Taylor as the only serious option to be called up as a replacement for Frenkie de Jong in the Dutch national team. The analyst of ESPN responds to De Jong's withdrawal after the Dutch team won a friendly match against Iceland (4-0 win).

“There is only one you can think of now: that is Kenneth Taylor. He has taken great revenge at Ajax,” says Kraay junior.

Calling up Taylor could be called controversial. Things went wrong for the midfielder in the Dutch team a year ago. He was substituted after 33 minutes in the disastrous European Championship qualifier against France (4-0 loss) in March 2023. After that, Ronald Koeman no longer called on Taylor.

Taylor then experienced an exceptionally difficult season with Ajax. The midfielder also had a hard time personally and was whistled at several times by the crowd in the Johan Cruijff ArenA.

At Ajax, Taylor received increasingly positive criticism from analysts at the end of the season. Kraay junior also believes that the dynamic midfielder has shown enough to be called up again. “Even if he is on the beach in Ibiza or in Dubai now…” Taylor is actually in the American city of Los Angeles, together with his girlfriend Jade Anna van Vliet.

Kraay junior thinks that Koeman could also handle the European Championship with the current selection. “At the moment I think Jerdy Schouten, Tijjani Reijnders and Joey Veerman are fighting for the two controlling positions, and that's fine for all three. I think Xavi Simons and Georginio Wijnaldum are fighting for the 10 position.”

Countries may replace players up to 24 hours before the start of the first match. Koeman has already announced that there will be a replacement for De Jong. The national coach is also awaiting the diagnosis for Teun Koopmeiners. The latter suffered a groin injury in the warm-up against Iceland.

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