Memphis Depay has opposed the NOS positive about the imminent appointment of Louis van Gaal as national coach of the Dutch. The almost seventy-year-old coach must lead the Dutch national team to success at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar as the successor to Frank de Boer who left after the disappointing European Championship. Van Gaal is no stranger to Depay, as the attacker presented by Barcelona on Thursday previously worked with him at the the Dutch squad and was brought to Manchester United by him in 2015.
“I see it as something positive. I have of course read a lot about it and am positive. I saw him at Manchester United, he brought me to that club when I was twenty. In the period before that, he already brought me into the Dutch national team. I’ve had great moments with him and learned a lot from him,” said Depay. In the first and only season that Depay and Van Gaal worked together in a club, the attacker was not always a basic player at Manchester United. Van Gaal, however, also let Depay make his debut in the Dutch and took him to the 2014 World Cup.
“I’ve been through a lot with him. Good experiences and perhaps less good ones, but I was young and I still had a lot to learn,” says the 27-year-old attacker, who will exchange Olympique Lyon for Barcelona this summer on a free transfer. “I have a positive feeling because I know he will be a good influence on the team. That is the most important. He will build a real team soon and that is what we need.”
Valentine Driessen will start in his column on Friday morning The Telegraph also on the appointment of Van Gaal. According to the newspaper’s chief of football, the new national coach must find a balance for himself between ‘system coach and player coach’. Driessen writes that Van Gaal hit the ‘first picket post’ by calling the the Dutch internationals ‘a glorified bunch of stars’. “Yet he will have to win the group of players that have been chastened at the World Cup compared to seven years ago in order to perform.”
“Van Gaal’s departure to the internationals – forgiven by the players, as he has forgiven them for dismissing him last year – is easy to put into perspective. After all, he saw the Dutch as a potential European champion and undoubtedly thinks he can become world champion in Qatar,” Driessen continues. He cites that Van Gaal ‘presently flirts’ with a 5-3-2 system, the formation with which the the Dutch squad stranded against the Czech Republic in the eighth final at the last European Championship. “His predecessor and apple of the eye Frank de Boer copied the 5-3-2 system and stuck to it so dogmatically that the the Dutch went under. Curious to see if Van Gaal learns from this by using the house style much more often.”
“There is also a role for the internationals,” Driessen emphasizes. “With their experience, they have to be more assertive towards the staff about their ideas, insights and wishes. Such open direct communication prevents you from looking at an accident that announces itself long in advance. Like during the European Championship when the internationals agreed to everything, De Boer spoke to his mouth instead of critically commenting on the game concept. Nice and nice to put your hand in your own bosom afterwards, but by then the calf had already drowned.”