Just when you thought the football season was done and dusted in Europe a bunch of international matches come along, starting with the first semi-final of the UEFA Nations League as the Netherlands host Croatia on Wednesday evening.
The reward for the winner of this match is a place in the final on Sunday against either Spain or Italy. The loser will be playing in a third placed match which absolutely nobody needs at this stage of a lengthy campaign.
Where to watch
The match will be shown live and in full in the UK on the Viaplay Sports 1 channel with the build-up beginning at 7.30pm and the semi-final kicking off at 7.45pm.
Netherlands
Given that they have home advantage in the Nations League finals, there was probably more motivation for the Netherlands in the initial stages of this competition than a number of their major rivals. We shouldn’t forget that this tournament started pretty much exactly a year ago when the elite nations chose to rest players knowing that they would need them at the World Cup five months later. That allowed the Dutch to repel the challenge of Belgium to reach the semi-final.
That was all done under Louis van Gaal but they will attempt to win the tournament on home soil under Ronald Koeman who will adopt a much more progressive, possession based style. It is fair to say that the Netherlands didn’t look fantastic on the start of their Euro 2024 qualifying campaign, the first competitive games back under Koeman, but you would imagine the longer they work under the Dutchman the better they will get. Even if they are not up to speed here they have a home crowd to spur them on.
Croatia
If there was a team who benefitted most from others chopping and changing and rotating their players in that first phase of the competition last summer it was Croatia. They faced a France side which looked nothing like the one which they had in the World Cup final and Denmark had their sights set elsewhere too. You can never criticise a team for winning but as I always say, context is important. Croatia showed they are a good tournament side though when they finished third at the World Cup.
I guess the big question for the Croatians in this match is after a long and demanding season whether the likes of Luka Modrid, Ivan Perisic et al have it in them to rouse themselves one more time. It would be fitting if Croatia were to win this match and go on and win the tournament because their golden generation deserves some success, but we know that football doesn’t always work out like that.
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Team News
The Netherlands will be without Memphis Depay with him failing to recover from the injury which saw him miss the end of the season. Nathan Ake and Denzel Dumphies played in the Champions League final at the weekend and will be assessed ahead of this one.
Croatia are going to be without their defensive lynchpin Josko Gvardiol as the Leipzig star is out with injury. Marcelo Brozovic was also involved in the Champions League final and he too will be assessed ahead of the game.
Betting
I will be interested to see how this match plays out. You would think after a long season which for a number of players began in July it will be a bit of a slow burner, especially if the heat that is around the UK lingers over the Netherlands throughout this contest. I just feel home advantage and a slightly younger and therefore potentially more at it Dutch side could get the job done here, although potentially in a tight match.
There is also no getting away from the incredible sized hole that the absence of Gvardiol could potentially leave for Croatia. While it would be better for the Dutch if they had Memphis Depay playing, they went to the quarter final of the World Cup with his impact being a minimal one and since then Cody Gakpo has gone to Liverpool and grown as a player which might lessen the loss of Depay. This feels like a tight home win sort of match to me.
Tips
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