The Dutch reading draws on the notion of building or continuing a national style of play. Specifically in the article the author discusses Coach Van Basten’s attempt to re-Hollandize the national team. This hits very close to home as a U.S. soccer fan. Under our last coach, Bob Bradley, the Americans played a defensive counter attacking style of football, an almost Italian mentality. Then when the current coach Jurgan Klinsman came in, he wanted to create an American style. First he tried to mimic Mexican style by bringing in many Mexican Americans. When this didn’t work Klinsman started bringing in German-Americans who play a “total soccer”, box to box, much like the Dutch or Germans.<\/p>\n
So far this has worked but what I learned through this is that even though nations historically have had a style, that they develop and teach young players through academies. The flow of information in the 21st century can change that style. One only needs to look at Brendan Rodgers, Liverpool’s Manager. He is from North Ireland, a region that would historically play a British style of soccer, bringing the ball out wide and crossing it into the box. However, he replaced a coach with that style (King Kenny Dauglish) and teaches a Tiki Taka style of football much like the Spanish.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
In the next reading, the author discusses how football matches between rival countries often lead to historical tensions and even some times violence through hooliganism. This reminded me of a story I read about post WWII matches between the Netherlands and Germany. Because of everything that happened during the Second World War, it was a always a bitter contest. Both nations would shut down and watch the game as if it was \u00a0a representation of their nations power just like a war. In essence what war and national football boil down to is a test of virility. In the end, the winner is deemed the better stronger nation.<\/p>\n
Similarly, the miracle on ice showed national tensions between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S. When the U.S. won, it was as if the United States had marched into Red Square and claimed the capital as its own. This all goes to show the importance of international football, and what it means to the players and fans when the whistle blows for an important match.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Dutch reading draws on the notion of building or continuing a national style of play. Specifically in the article the author discusses Coach Van Basten’s attempt to re-Hollandize the national team. This hits very close to home as a U.S. soccer fan. Under our last coach, Bob Bradley, the Americans played a defensive counter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":710,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/778"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/710"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=778"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/778\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":855,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/778\/revisions\/855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/sportshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}