Beautiful Bridesmaids Dressed in Oranje

Gary Thacker

Description

Beautiful Bridesmaids Dressed in Oranje: The Unfulfilled Glory of Dutch Football is the story of a dazzling football dream. Built on the club successes of Ajax and Feyenoord, it's a utopian ideal that blazed with a bright but ephemeral Oranje flame, scorching the football pitches of the world in the 1970s. Although Dutch clubs dominated the European Cup from 1969 to 1973, until 1974 the Oranje had failed to qualify for a World Cup for 36 years. Two finals then followed in successive tournaments, as 'totaalvoetbal' burst from its chrysalis, proudly revealing to the world its wings adorned with vivid shades of Oranje. The winners were the brides. It was their day, but the Dutch sides were more beautiful, yet so fragile, and football loved them for it. This isn't merely a tale of bridesmaids who came so close yet failed gloriously. It is the celebration of a footballing counter-culture, a revolution, a flame that burned so brightly, but so briefly. It's the story of those Beautiful Bridesmaids Dressed in Oranje.

Sujets

• Países Bajos
• Netherlands

Informations

• Publié par: Pitch Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 14 juin 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781785319518
• Langue: English

Extrait

First published by Pitch Publishing, 2021
Pitch Publishing
A2 Yeoman Gate
Yeoman Way
Durrington
BN13 3QZ
www.pitchpublishing.co.uk
©Gary Thacker, 2021
Every effort has been made to trace the copyright.
Any oversight will be rectified in future editions at the earliest opportunity by the publisher.
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A CIP catalogue record is available for this book from the British Library
Print ISBN 9781785318467
eBook ISBN 9781785319518
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CONTENTS
Acknowledgements
Foreword
Introduction
Part 1: A Brief History of Oranje
From birth until the First World War
The inter-war years
Post-war: 1946–72
Part 2: Double Dutch Dominance
The links that bind
Ajax
Feyenoord
Ajax again
Feyenoord again
The links that bind again
Part 3: The 1974 World Cup
Qualification
Preparation
The tournament
Part 4: The 1976 European Championship
Qualification
The tournament
Part 5: The 1978 World Cup
Qualification
Preparation
The tournament
Part 6: Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow
Tomorrow: 1980–88
… and tomorrow … 1988
… and tomorrow 1988–2000
… and tomorrow: 1996–2010
Part 7: Is the Future Oranje?
Index
Photos
This book is dedicated to my wife Sue, to Megan and Luke, Lydia and Gregory, to my Beautiful Princess Dolores and my gorgeous new granddaughter Polly.
It is also dedicated to all those who always supported and believed in me
You are my strength.
And to those who only ever doubted me.
You are my inspiration.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Many people have assisted in the production of this book.
The following have generously agreed to be interviewed, and allowed me to use their wise words:
• Jan-Willem Bult – Former player and KNVB qualified coach. International film and TV maker, football expert, initiator of Twitter @ Netherlands1974
• Jan-Hermen de Bruijn – Dutch football journalist, commentator and former owner and chief editor of the football magazine ELF Voetbal
• Alex Frosio – Gazzetta dello Sport journalist
• Raphael Honigstein – Author, journalist, broadcaster and presenter
• Nico-Jan Hoogma – KNVB (Dutch FA) director of top football.
• Ray Hudson – Former professional footballer, US football journalist and radio host
• Graham Hunter – European football journalist
• Abraham Klein – World Cup referee
• Rob Smyth – Author and Guardian journalist
• Michael Statham – Dutch football writer
• Dr Peter Watson – Teaching Fellow in the Department of Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American Studies, University of Leeds
Additionally, research for the book has been massively assisted by the following:
• Stuart Horsfield
• Mike Nasrallah
• Steven Scragg
• Aidan Williams
Finally, thanks to all at Pitch Publishing for their professionalism and dedication.
Sincere thanks to one and all.
FOREWORD
IF YOU get the opportunity to see a legend in the flesh, you do it. Back in March 1978, I was 21 years old, and since the early years of that decade had been an unashamed adherent to the doctrine of Total Football. I was seduced by the poetry of the Ajax team that dominated European club football, lifting the European Cup three times in succession.
The love deepened with the extravagant beauty, and ultimate fragility, of the bright flame of the Netherlands national team as they scorched the pitches of West Germany in the 1974 World Cup, before the fire became too fierce and their wings of wax melted. Football’s Prometheus, Icarus in Oranje.
This was no one-night stand or clumsily fumbling embrace. This was a lasting bromance. We all lock on to some paradigm of play that we believe to be the true faith. In 1978 mine was – and remains – that having players with skill, that are comfortable on the ball with outrageous belief and commitment, regardless of the position they play, is the baseline requirement, and then you weave those talents into the fabric of a team.
Although second in my admiration to the titan that was Barry Hulshoff when they both sported Ajax’s iconic red and white shirts, Johan Cruyff was the torch-bearer, guardian of the eternal flame kindled by Rinus Michels. By 1978, Cruyff had absconded from Amsterdam and decamped to the Camp Nou, to hook up with his old coach and reignite the passions of Barcelona’s culés. Trophies had followed and, although unknown at the time, a new structure had been born that would change the club, and indeed European football, forever.
Cruyff had moved to Catalunya in 1973 and the 1977/78 season would be his last in Spain before what was almost a sabbatical year in California with Los Angeles Aztecs.
In March 1978, Barcelona had been drawn to play Aston Villa in the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup. The Blaugrana – and Cruyff – were coming to the West Midlands. Living just north of Birmingham, this was my chance to go and see the great man in the flesh, to pay homage to one of the all-time great players. Was I going to miss the chance to watch the Dutch master paint some entrancing pictures in real life? Was I heck as like! Queuing for tickets was a cheap price to pay, as was the journey by foot, bus and train to get to Villa Park.
There I was in the crowd, just behind the home dugout, when Cruyff picked up the ball around halfway. With that unique style, he drove forward, swerving and gliding. Were his feet even touching the floor? I’m still not sure. On he went, evading rather than beating defenders, then drove a cross-shot into the far corner of the net. I stood up and cheered, enraptured by the moment. All around me, home fans scowled at my celebration, but still applauded the goal.
The pitch was wet and hardly like the snooker-table surfaces of today, but it was the perfect stage for Cruyff. Whilst others slogged on, heavy-legged, with damp, cold and fatigue clawing at aching muscles, he was the will-o’-the-wisp skating over the surface. Sometimes when you have high expectations of something anticipated, there’s an almost inevitable anticlimax. Not on that night. Not with Johan Cruyff. It wasn’t the Grand Canyon, but it was mightily grand.
With eight minutes or so remaining, and Barcelona two goals clear, Cruyff – wearing No.9, rather than his iconic 14 – limped away to the dressing-room. Although their team had been unable to cope with his majesty, the Villa fans rose and applauded him off the pitch.
For me, that was enough. Along with more than a few disappointed home fans, I turned up my collar against the cold of the Birmingham night, and headed for the exits and the long, convoluted journey home. Walking away, I heard two roars suggesting a comeback from the home team that hadn’t really looked on the cards for 80-odd minutes. The game ended in a 2-2 draw. Barcelona would progress after winning the second leg 2-1, but would lose in the semi-finals to PSV Eindhoven, the eventual winners. I didn’t know it then, but a beautiful dream was on the cusp of passing into a lamented past, a legacy unfulfilled.
Three months later the Dutch, this time without Cruyff, but still with much of the flair echoing from 1974, would lose another World Cup Final to the country hosting the competition. As I turned my back on Villa Park, I little knew that the football I had come to so admire was destined to perish into ashes a few months later. When it happened, I felt cheated, frustrated and annoyed that the gods of football had denied the world a celebration befitting such beguiling football. It should have been 1974. It should have been 1978, but both were denied.
While football held a party, celebrating German efficiency and Argentine passion, a beautiful girl sat quietly in the corner, two silver, not gold, tears rolling down her cheeks, one for each lost final. There would be no celebration for the Beautiful Bridesmaid in Oranje. It wasn’t to be her party. It wasn’t my party either, but I’ll cry if I want to.
INTRODUCTION
‘The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars.’ 1 Kerouac, Jack, On the Road (New York: Viking Press, 1957)
CASTING HIMSELF in the personification of Sal Paradisie, Jack Kerouac expounds a philosophy desirous of passion and exhilaration; always the exceptional, never the mundane. Kerouac evokes a spiritual journey, an invitation to pursue belief, identity and an essential meaning for life. Eschewing the sheer ordinariness of a workaday world sated with consumerism, Paradisie and his fellow travellers, each of whom represent a kindred spirit in real life – Dean Moriarty (Neal Cassady), Carlo Marx (Allen Ginsberg), and Old Bull Lee (William S. Burroughs) – ache for something more, something exceptional, something sensational.
When English referee Jack Taylor blew for full time on 7 July 1974, the Dutch team of flaring brilliance stood dejected. The bright Oranje flame of their football had scorched the tournament but, in the end, being the best team simply wasn’t sufficient to deliver the trophy. A team that had entertained and entranced in equal measure, had sadly lost out at the very last. What had taken the Dutch so far had also doomed them to their fate. They had been magnificent, and the brilliance of their football had endeared them to so many fans, but