Napoli had good reason to be
wary. One week earlier, on Sunday
September 27, the club had beaten
Genoa 6-0 in Naples. On the day
before that game, Genoa’s goalkeeper,
Mattia Perin, had tested positive for
COVID. He was obviously omitted
from the squad for Naples.
However, even if Perin stayed at
home in Genoa, the COVID virus did
not. On the day after the 6-0 drubbing
in Naples,14 Genoa players tested
positive. By the end of that week, that
number had risen to 22. It is at least
arguable, therefore, that the Genoa
cluster also infected Napoli.
Italian sports minister Vincenzo
Spadafora called the entire affair a
“miserable spectacle,” suggesting that a
postponement would have been better.
Health minister Roberto Speranza
sounded a critical note when he
said that now was not the time to
be thinking about football, rather
keeping Italian schools open was
more important.
Yet this incident prompts a whole
series of as yet unanswered questions.
When, where and why should the
regional authorities intervene to
effectively stop a game being played?
Is the infamous protocol essentially
irrelevant, given that it does not
appear to have the final say?
In the wake of the debacle, both
clubs came in for bitter criticism. On
the one hand, some doubted Napoli’s
motives, suggesting that, with three
key players missing (COVID victims
Elmas and Zielinski as well as the
injured Lorenzo Insigne), they just
did not want to play.
On the other hand,Juventus
were just looking for the three easy
“walkover” points, said others. Naples-
born politician, Luigi Iovino, who tabled
a parliamentary question about the
non-game, took that line, saying:
“Health comes before everything.
Juventus should not try to exploit
a health crisis. The game should
have been postponed because there
simply were not the basic health
requirements for the staging of
a match.”
With the federation still due to rule
on the mishap at the time of writing,
this story may well run and run.
Paddy Agnew
“I
nfrontofyouis
sitting a very happy
person”, said Frank
de Boer at the
press conference
for his appointment
as the Netherlands’
national coach. “Even though you can’t
always say that about me.”
He was referring to his often-surly
facial expression, but his remarks also
summarised the divided reaction to his
appointment. Relief and happiness
from the De Boer camp and at the
Dutch FA, but vexation throughout
the rest of the country.
Although he represented theOranje
112 times, making him the third-most
capped player (behind Wesley Sneijder
and Edwin van der Sar), De Boer was
not the obvious choice to succeed
Ronald Koeman. His track record
in recent years has been too poor.
The Dutch FA had a serious problem
when Koeman failed to resist the lure
of Barcelona. His contract contained
a clause that meant he could leave
for his former club if it ever came
knocking. So when the Catalan giants
considered him the best option to
succeed the sacked Quique Setien,
there was nothing the Dutch FA
could do to change his mind.
But what next? The squad was
happy to continue with assistant coach
Dwight Lodeweges. And the Canadian-
born Lodeweges, whose parents
migrated after World War II, was coach
during the Nations League matches
against Poland and Italy. However, he
did not convince, failing to have an
answer to the constant Italian attacksin a1-0 defeat in Amsterdam. And, after
coaching unfashionable clubs such as
Cambuur, PEC Zwolle and amateur club
VVOG, he was never seen as the ideal
representative of the national team
but more as the perfect assistant.
The federation turned to former
coach Frank Rijkaard, who has been
out of football for many years, and
Peter Bosz, who recently renewed
his contract at Bayer Leverkusen.
Both turned it down.
Then the name of Louis van Gaal
was mentioned as caretaker until the
European Championship. The former
Manchester United manager, who led
Netherlands to third spot at the 2014
World Cup, seemed to be interested.
However, the squad, as skipper and
spokesman Virgil van Dijk made clear
in veiled terms, wasn’t particularly keen.
Neither was the Dutch FA, fearing that
Van Gaal would turn everything that
had been built in recent years upside
down, both on and off the pitch.
So finally candidate number four,
Frank de Boer, had the approval of the
board and the team, but others remain
unconvinced – an opinion based on his
three managerial spells abroad. His
reign at Internazionale lasted only 85
days, at Crystal Palace just ten weeks
and at Atlanta United a year and a half.
He was sacked by each club.
This is in stark contrast to the start
of his career. De Boer was Bert van
Marwijk’s assistant when Netherlands
got to the 2010 World Cup final and,
once standing on his own two feet,
led his boyhood club Ajax to four
consecutive Eredivisie titles.
The time seemed right to go abroad,
but the 50-year-old never found the
perfect match.Jose Mourinho even
labelled him the “worst manager in the
history of the Premier League”.
However, he isn’t the only one to
blame. At Inter he was confronted with
mutinous players who disagreed with
the board, while in London he was
asked to renovate the Crystal Palace
team – who then panicked when results
were poor. Perhaps De Boer is better
off at home. If he can relaunch his
career with national team success
and rediscover the magic of his early
managerial spell, he won’t be the only
happy person in the Netherlands.
Klaas-Jan DroppertAppointment...
Netherlands’ new
coach De Boer holds
his iconic No.4 shirtFrank de Boer
New Netherlands coach has a lot to prove
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