Arguably the Netherlands’ greatest ever player, Marco van Basten has given his take on two of the national team’s current stars.
The three-time Ballon d’Or winner was giving his take on the Oranjie’s October international break which saw two 4-0 wins over Finland and Malta.
With eight goals scored and zero conceded you’d might think there’s not much to complain about, but Van Basten thinks with the quality of the competition he could’ve seen more.
Discussing captain Virgil van Dijk, he said of the Liverpool defender: “I think Van Dijk needs to be the leader.
“He needs to lead by example and be the driving force. I miss that in him. I find his mentality easy-going.
“He’s a fantastic player, perhaps the best defender we have in the world. He can head the ball, is quick, tall, and has a good overview.
“But he’s not the leader who drives the team forward… and that would actually benefit the team. I hope Arne Slot can teach him something.”
On Barcelona’s Frenkie De Jong he added: “Well, I did think Frenkie de Jong didn’t play much forward. He was a bit of a postman.
“You’d expect him to speed up the play. I actually found that a bit of a disappointment, because his role should be to move the ball quickly from the back to the front. I found it striking that he didn’t do that at all yesterday.
“That was really lacking from Frenkie yesterday. It’s a shame, really, because he’s a good player who has the vision to send someone forward.”
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