WC2014 Oztralia 2 – 3 Holland


Kapow! Tim Cahill vents a lifetime's worth of 'shortarse' anger in one massive volley

Kapow! Tim Cahill vents a lifetime’s worth of ‘shortarse’ anger in one massive volley

Bosh! ‘Ave A Bang On That

As chuckly cuddle boy Ray Winstone might put it. There are goals and there are goals. And so far this World Cup has had a good deal of them, but this one was a bit special. Like Robin van Persie’s goal of the season one from 2013, or indeed, Robin van Persie’s great goal at Arsenal the previous season, this was a crossfield ball dropped invitingly in front of a running striker, who met it on the volley and lashed it into the net with all the fury of a man who’s been told he will only ever score from headers. And while it didn’t have quite the psychological impact of van Persie’s Casillas crushing head dink of last week, it was a bloody good shot nonetheless.

Another Awesome Display

The Dutch don’t do it easy.  Either they like to go behind before they go in front, or they like to concede just after they’ve taken the lead. Each way, the goals keep coming and they’re usually quite good. Robben started it with what now seems like a typical ‘run all the way down the middle, then lash it into the net’ type goal, which appeared to break the deadlock of a pitbull Oz against the determined Dutch.

They were only ahead for 90 seconds before the Oz were level. Cahill’s goal was outstanding and, as with their match against Chile, it seemed to fully energise the Oztralians. You almost feel that if they could only do this from the off, they wouldn’t be going home quite so soon.

And once they got going, they caused the Dutch a load of problems. Their pressure gave them the lead after they got a penalty (another dubious penalty in this World Cup of dubious penalties) when the ball was ‘handled’ in the box. But, ultimately it was for nothing as the Dutch quickly equalised, then pushed on to win the game.

You can’t help feeling that the Dutch are ignoring the advice of Shakespeare, spending all their excitement and verve too early. They can’t continue this level of excitement can they?

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