The Netherlands has long revered attacking soccer, but on Sunday night in Eindhoven, it was a defender’s turn to be feted. Virgil van Dijk, the Dutch captain, was making his 100th appearance for his country in a Nations League fixture against Serbia, and in the dying seconds he showed why he remains the Netherlands’ most important player, thudding a loose ball away from Luka Jović as the Serbian striker primed himself to score a late equalizer. Van Dijk’s late intervention secured a 2-1 win for the Dutch, and salvaged a positive end to a mixed first run of games under new manager Xavi Hernández.
Van Dijk has been the one constant presence through his nation’s ups and downs over the past decade. He made his debut in 2015, a 2-1 victory on the Central Asian steppes against Kazakhstan that still wasn’t enough to help the Dutch qualify for the 2016 Euros. They didn’t reach the 2018 World Cup either, but it was Van Dijk who marked the symbolic rebirth of Dutch soccer with a late equalizer against Germany that sent Oranje to the 2019 Nations League Finals. There had been speculation that the 35-year-old Van Dijk would call time on his international career after an underwhelming World Cup. Then Xavi called. “After ten seconds it was clear that I would continue,” Van Dijk told the press. Asked how the new coach kept him in the Dutch fold, the Liverpool man replied: “He told me that I’m Virgil van Dijk.”
So it was that Van Dijk led his team onto the field at the tidy, symmetrical Philips Stadion on Sunday evening, his young son striding out with him. Xavi had made four changes from the 2-2 draw away to Greece on Thursday, with Tijjani Reijnders and Ryan Gravenberch restored to the midfield and Teun Koopmeiners at center-back. In Greece, the Dutch had plodded through the first half, slow in possession and conceding twice on the counter. In Eindhoven, the aim was to be quicker and to pierce through Serbia’s five-man defense.
The Netherlands started spryly, and had their first major chance inside of three minutes. The move began deep in the Dutch half, where Joey Veerman dispossessed Lazar Samardžić before passing to Noa Lang. He slipped the ball to Gravenberch, the tall Liverpool midfielder loping down the right and picking out Crysencio Summerville on the overlap. Summerville’s cross was deceptive, sailing over Serbia goalkeeper Vanja Milinković-Savić and falling to Lang, whose control was lacking, the ball sputtering off his ankle before squirming its way to Mexx Meerdink. The AZ Alkmaar striker had scored twice against Serbia last weekend in Belgrade, but his effort was wayward, drifting high over the bar.
The Netherlands’ attacking intentions were clear. Though listed as a defender, Koopmeiners was acting as an extra midfielder in the early going, Xavi’s team playing essentially in a 3-1-3-3 formation. Much of their play was flowing through Veerman, the Borussia Dortmund midfielder back in the pasture he used to roam in his four seasons with PSV. It was he who registered the game’s first shot on target, an attempt from the edge of the box which Milinković-Savić saved low to his right. And Veerman set in motion the events that led to the opening goal.
With 29 minutes gone, Veerman hit a first-time pass to Summerville on the Dutch right, the Al-Hilal winger then feinting past Strahinja Pavlović and winning a free kick just outside the penalty area. Koopmeiners, a left-footer known for his set-piece prowess, stepped up to take from an angle that looked too acute to score from, right at the elbow of the box. Serbia’s wall, though, was porous, and Koopmeiners’s low effort spun through a gap and traveled into the visitors’ goal.
It was a deserved lead, but its life would be short. Dušan Tadić, the longtime Ajax captain whose name had been booed as the lineups were announced, slipped a pass to Serbian wing-back Aleksa Terzić. His cross from near the dead-ball line reached teenaged striker Mihailo Cvetković, whose looped header fell gently into Bart Verbruggen’s net. Around the stadium, little pockets of Serbian fans flashed their flags with a double-headed eagle on them. Veljko Paunović’s team had lost five straight matches, but their response to falling behind was emphatic.
Serbia also had the first opportunity of the second half. Seconds after the restart, defender Stefan Gudelj scooped up an errant pass in midfield and ambled unchecked through the Dutch half before pushing a ball toward Cvetković. The teenager did the first part well, beating Koopmeiners to the ball and sending him skidding on the turf, but the shot was a letdown: with only Verbruggen to beat, Cvetković bent wide from eight yards out.
The visitors would create little more, but Oranje were also stale in attack. With twenty minutes remaining, Xavi was looking at a third draw in four matches to open his tenure. Then the Dutch briefly upped the pace. Denzel Dumfries, playing high on the right, rolled a cross across the penalty area which Reijnders sprinted to keep in play, then flicked back along the goalline to the unmarked Joshua Zirkzee. It was the easiest of finishes for Zirkzee, the Manchester United striker notching his first goal for club or country since December, and it came at a vital moment.
Serbia didn’t accept defeat lightly. The Netherlands spent the final minutes playing with ten, Micky van de Ven having left injured after all substitutions had been used, and they barricaded themselves around the goal trying not to concede. Nemanja Gudelj struck a dipping effort which Verbruggen palmed over. Then, right as the five additional minutes were about to elapse, a ball tumbled out of the air onto Cvetković’s knee, ricocheting into Jović’s path less than ten yards out. In swooped Van Dijk to clear. He wasn’t going to allow his big day to be spoiled.
