World Cup 2010 Final - Holland vs Spain

After the exciting 3rd/4th place game, many people were looking forward to the finals hoping for better game and excitement. Unfortunately that was not meant to be, what we got was a game of pure aggression. In the end the right team won. Spain got the cup with their usual 1-0 score.

Spain played their usual short but quick passing game. The quirky Jabulani ball really suited the Spanish gameplay. To play against Spain, three strategies can be used.
One is pure defense and then strike Spain during counter attack as was shown by Switzerland. The other strategy is aggressive football where every ball is fought over and no space is given to the Spanish players. This was shown excellently by Paraguay, who nearly won the game against Spain. This strategy requires a lot of stamina and strong upper bodies to wrestle the ball away from the Spanish players without committing hard tackles.

Another strategy is to use long passes across the field, which is quite popular in English football. This strategy is not recommended since the Jabulani ball is difficult to predict for long passes as was evident throughout the championship.

The wily Dutch used another strategy - controlled violence. This strategy requires the expectation that the referee will be inclined to keep same number of players in the field for both sides for the game. The strategy worked. The Dutch managed to rattle the Spanish game and managed to be dangerous in the later parts of the game.

The Dutch also used similar strategies against Brazil especially in the second half of the game and managed to escape caution from the referee.

The game was ugly to watch. There was so many fouls committed. Initially it was the Dutch who did most of the fouls but soon the exasperated Spanish followed suit. The karate kick given to Xabi Alonso deserved a red card but the perpetrator escaped with only a yellow. The referee had a hard nite but did admirably for most of the game. It was impossible for the ref to look after the game if one side is determined to foul no matter what the consequence.

The game would have gone to penalties if not for the strange substitution of Giovanni Van Bronkhorst, who was the best player in the Dutch team. After he was out, the Dutch defense turned into a joke.

It was the comedic multiple pinball clearance by the Dutch defense that handed the ball to Cesc Fabregas who nicely passed it to the onside Iniesta to score the decisive goal. The Dutch have themselves to blame for this and instead went after all the officials on the field.

The football authorities should come up with a new foul card - ideally orange in color - to commemorate the ugly game provided by the Dutch. This card will be in between the yellow and red card and will force the player who received it to be out of the game for 15 minutes or so. This will reduce the burden of referees who may be unwilling to spoil a game by giving a red card early on.

So congratulations to Spain for winning the 2010 tournament. The Dutch should go back to the drawing board and relearn the beautiful football they have created but abandoned in this World Cup.