Hans Kraay Jr followed Louis van Gaal’s presentation as national coach of the Dutch national team from the first to the last minute. The former football player and analyst said he saw again ‘a great Louis van Gaal show’ and regretted the national coach’s animosity towards the media. Van Gaal’s press conference in Zeist was extensively discussed on Tuesday evening at the Voetbal Talk program on ESPN, where Marciano Vink had also hoped Van Gaal would have presented himself differently five years after his forced departure from Manchester United.
Kraay Jr. said it was ‘not a pity at all’ that he was not at Van Gaal’s presentation on Tuesday, referring to the clashes between Van Gaal and his person in the past. “That has been the case and you shouldn’t want to look that up anymore,” emphasized the analyst. “It’s not interesting at all. Some television programs have asked me to show old fragments again, but my wife has brushed them all off. It’s just done. It’s been exciting. My mother, who is now looking from above, is glad I don’t do it anymore. He thought it was terrible. Pascal Kamperman is doing it now and he is doing great.”
Van Gaal: “I would also have come to myself if I were the KNVB”
In any case, it was ‘the great Louis van Gaal show’, emphasized Kraay Jr. Marciano Vink, who was also present, had actually hoped for a different press conference ‘after five years’. “I had hoped that he would be a little more accessible, that he would be less confrontational with the media. I just felt the hostile atmosphere again and I just thought that was a shame. He already set the tone with ‘the friends of the media’ and there was no need for that.” Vink was convinced that Van Gaal wanted to talk in advance about the importance of fitness in connection with the short preparation time. “But the common thread was a bit of suspicion and hostility. I just thought that was a shame.”
Kraay Jr. hopes that the third marriage between Van Gaal and the Dutch national team will be a success story. “But why the hostility? Surely there must be someone… His wife, Truus, an intelligent woman. Someone will say, “Louis, unless someone asks a disproportionate question, be charming.” Wouldn’t that have been a new Van Gaal for all of us? Before he even asked one question, he had already counted all the heads.” Vink saw ‘bad-dining’ remarks fly by, such as ‘the newspaper’, referring to Valentijn Driessen and his employer De Telegraaf. But also that Van Gaal denied that he meant the Dutch national team when he referred to ‘the glorified bunch of stars’ this summer. “Just name it. Now everyone had to gamble.”
“Of course we assumed that he meant the Netherlands, because it had gone so badly. You’ve been letting everyone guess and think he meant the Dutch national team all along. And that’s how it turned out. I thought it was a shame that such things were mentioned again,” emphasized Vink. Kraay Jr. emphasized that Van Gaal has been the official national coach for weeks and that it was not necessary to immediately say at the press conference that the KNVB had to come to him. “He said: ‘With who else?’. And not even with a smile. With a little self-mockery for example. Well, with Henk ten Cate, Erik ten Hag or Henk Fraser.” Vink still knows Van Gaal from his active career at Ajax and called Van Gaal ‘super’ as a person. In any case, his relationship with the media has “broken enormously somewhere”, emphasizes the former midfielder. “He’s coming back to that now, as a somewhat older man.”
“I think he should let that go. Come with fresh impetus and start your story with how the Netherlands can beat Norway. Without setting the tone from the first minute and everyone thinking: There it is again.” Kraay Jr.: “I didn’t expect anything else.” The former football player pointed out that many former Van Gaal players still walk away with the national coach as a person, and Vink recognized that image. “If you fit into his group, as a player or as a driver, he is a very warm man. Something is changing towards the media and he is very wary. And then he seeks confrontation. I think he needs that to stay standing”, emphasized the former player of Ajax, among others.
Kraay Jr. says he became ‘very nervous’ from sentences such as ‘I am a kneader’ and ‘I am a process trainer’ and ‘usually my teams start functioning after three months’. “Then I worry, because he only has a day and a half,” he pointed to the ultra short time between the last competition matches and the international match in and against Norway.