Holland’s participation in Euro 2016 is now in grave doubt. Their 1-0 loss to Group A leaders Iceland in Amsterdam last thursday put them six points behind Czech Republic in the race for the second automatic qualification spot – with only three games remaining – against Turkey,Kazakhstan and the Czech Republic.
Bruno Martins Indi got a red card in the first half and the Dutch coach had the following to say about that moment of madness.
” It went wrong with the red card of Martins Indi. We knew this was going to be a tough match. They play with a lot of discipline and don’t give away many chances. We had some trouble with finding Robben, but after while we succeeded more and more.
And then came the moment that we give it away ourselves. I really blame Martins Indi for that, you know what the stakes are. I haven’t seen it, but I heard it was a deserved red card. It’s part of football, that you control yourself. There was no reason to do that and we paid a big price for this.”
Gylfi Sigurdsson then squeezed home a 51st-minute penalty for Iceland for the game’s only goal.
Holland then went and lost their next game to Turkey 3- 0 the video highlights of which can be seen here
Czech Republic meanwhile beat Latvia 2 -1 booking their passage to France.Holland now have to win their last two games if they want to get near the playoffs.
An analysis of Holland’s descent from total football to total disaster here