Valentijn Driessen questions ‘the dubious role’ of the KNVB and agent Mino Raiola regarding Mohamed Ihattaren. The midfielder showed himself extensively on Thursday for the first time since he disappeared from the radar at Sampdoria. The fallen top talent of PSV was in The Telegraph candid about the last few months and would like to end a dark period with a return to the Dutch fields.
On his return to the Netherlands, Ihattaren changed agent – he exchanged Raiola for Ali Dursun – and he is now working on his fitness with former international Gerald Vanenburg, among others. “Ihattaren’s current entourage has the best intentions for him,” Driessen says in his column on Friday The Telegraph. “They want to save him as a person and as a footballer. Vanenburg is willing to make sacrifices, as long as Ihattaren can afford to work with the same work ethic every day.”
“All in all, the situation is sad. Equally sad is the situation for Dutch football society if it fails to save the greatest talent of the past ten years from destruction by abandoning him to his fate. Will the Netherlands allow this to happen?” the newspaper’s chief of football openly wonders. Driessen points out that ‘a dream transfer has become a nightmare’. “For the last six months, as a child, he has been lost in the big human world, with the big money, with big clubs like PSV, Juventus and Sampdoria and has become a plaything for the people around him.”
“Ihattaren is responsible for his own life, but his environment with his family and agent Mino Raiola are equally responsible for the current destruction of his football career.” Driessen wonders where the people are who were happy when Ihattaren did not choose Morocco but the Netherlands, or years earlier when he won the European Championship with the Netherlands Under 17. “Will the KNVB let this top talent drown? Like former national coach Frank de Boer did. Or his counterpart at the Dutch Juniors, Erwin van de Looi, who completely ignored him. Or director of top football Nico-Jan Hoogma.”
Driessen finds it regrettable that Hoogma, ‘the guardian of Dutch football’, reportedly never bothered to talk to ‘the greatest talent’ when his career ended up in a negative spiral. “He let his national team coaches get away with weak excuses when they passed him for the national teams. Or someone like national coach Louis van Gaal takes the initiative and gets in touch. To grab him by the hand. Or to offer him the campus in Zeist and the expertise there to support him in his fight back to the top.”
Ihattaren’s interview in The Telegraph in Driessen’s view is ‘an invitation from a nineteen-year-old who no longer knows, asks for help and who desperately needs his last chance’. “Wondering whether Dutch top clubs or the KNVB will continue to sit on their hands or try to prevent the loss of this child and top talent.” Ihattaren had to leave PSV last summer after a series of incidents and was taken over for 1.9 million euros by Juventus, which leased him directly to Sampdoria. Things went wrong at the club from Genoa. The playmaker said he was all alone and decided to go back to the Netherlands in October without consultation.
“I left because of the circumstances at Sampdoria. When I was nineteen, I was sitting there in a hotel room. Alone, completely left to my fate. I couldn’t bear it anymore,” Ihattaren assured The Telegraph. “All kinds of agreements were not fulfilled. As if I didn’t exist. I received no salary, nothing was arranged, no bank account or insurance. Then I chose myself, protected myself and left. The confidence was gone.”
According to various media, Ihattaren, born in Utrecht, will play for FC Utrecht on a rental basis for a year and a half. The teen doesn’t want to confirm that. “I know that I haven’t played football for half a year and will need about four games to get into my rhythm. I really need to get fit now,” he says. “I know I can get that done quickly. That was also evident last summer. I want to sweat, get cramps. I want to feel like I’m playing football again. Delicious.”