Despite a goal from the Netherlands, the first half was difficult. Memphis Depay made the first goal for the Netherlands in the 23rd minute. After a cross from Denzel Dumfries, Depay headed in the ball.
Then the game crashed. Weghorst got the ball in front of goal twice, but was unable to complete his action. Furthermore, the Orange had few opportunities.
Quick second goal
After the break, the Netherlands started more offensively. In the 50th minute, left back Aké scored a quick second goal via the post. Shortly afterwards, Gibraltar went from eleven to ten players, following a red card for Liam Walker. Feyenoord player Mats Wieffer got his opponent’s foot on his ankle.
It was a long wait for a third ball in the net. In the 82nd minute it was again Aké who scored.
Unmasked
Last Friday, the Orange lost the first match in the European Championship qualification 4-0 against France. Cody Gakpo, Matthijs de Ligt, Sven Botman, Joey Veerman and Bart Verbruggen all had to drop out due to stomach flu.
De Ligt was back in the base tonight. Gakpo and Verbruggen started on the bench, but Gakpo came on in the second half. Right back Denzel Dumfries returned to De Kuip after a suspension.
The Netherlands won 7-0 and 6-0 against Gibraltar two years ago, which suffered its biggest defeat to date against Belgium six years ago (9-0). National coach Ronald Koeman said earlier that the Orange could only put things right with many goals after Friday’s failure in France.
Thijs Slegers
Just before the game between the Dutch national team and Gibraltar, a minute’s silence was held for Thijs Slegers, PSV’s press secretary who died at the age of 46 from leukemia.
Slegers announced at the beginning of February that he had been told by the doctors that they could no longer help him. The former sports journalist then called on everyone to become a blood and stem cell donor, which resulted in thousands of new donors for the Sanquin blood bank and the Matchis Foundation.
