Louis van Gaal will soon speak out about the political controversies surrounding the World Cup in Qatar, Valentijn Driessen knows. The national coach of the Dutch National Team refused to do that after the decisive qualifying match with Norway last November (2-0 win). Driessen reports in a video of The Telegraph that KNVB director Marianne van Leeuwen hoped that Van Gaal would still comment on the matter, which the coach now also seems to be planning.
“I had an interview with the new director of professional football of the KNVB, Van Leeuwen,” Driessen starts. “He also hopes that Van Gaal will speak out personally about Qatar, about working conditions, about human rights. And now I have just heard that Van Gaal was also planning to do so himself.” After the game with Norway, the national coach indicated that he was ‘not the right person’ to give his opinion about working conditions in a country.
Van Gaal indicated that he would rather leave communication ‘to the KNVB and other gentlemen’, which resulted in a lot of criticism. Rightly so, says Driessen. “He is a figurehead after all. When he expresses himself, it comes across differently than when Gijs de Jong, the secretary-general of the KNVB, does. I think that Van Gaal will still speak out at the end of the interview. good news this year. Then he shows himself from a completely different side.”
In addition to Van Gaal, Georginio Wijnaldum also refused to comment on the situation in Qatar. “We conform to the KNVB and the national coach and have to concentrate on the matches. Our work is football,” said the captain of the Dutch national team after the game with Norway. The KNVB visited Qatar in early December to monitor the situation of migrant workers in the country. The union then indicated, among other things, that it is working on laws that improve working conditions for the workers.
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