The Netherlands and Japan meet in Dallas, Texas on Sunday in what promises to be an absolute beauty to open up Group F.
WATCH — Netherlands v Japan
Ronald Koeman has the Dutch moving in the right direction as they reached the semifinals of the European Championships two years ago and have been extremely consistent. They have a solid, technical team but are perhaps just missing a spark in attack to be considered one of the favorites to win it all.
Japan are being tipped by many as a genuine darkhorse team, and the word team sums them up perfectly. Japan are in the top 20 of the world rankings and are looking to build on their run to the last 16 of the 2022 World Cup, where many believe they should have gone further.
Netherlands vs Japan live score, updates: 0-0
How to watch Netherlands vs Japan live, stream link and start time
Kick off time:4pm ET Sunday (June 14)
Venue:AT&T Stadium — Dallas, Texas
TV Channel: Telemundo
Streaming: Stream live on Peacock, en Espanol
Japan find foot after nervy opening
The Dutch rattled the Samurai Blue within moments of kickoff, forcing New Jersey-born Zion Suzuki into a save.
But Japan went the other way and held the ball in Netherlands territory for some time, earning a dangerous free kick but not doing much to add to the peril.
0-0, 9′
Netherlands team news, focus
The main injury concern for the Dutch is Brighton goalkeeper Bart Verbruggen going down with an injury in their final warm up game. Koeman has a big decision to make as to whether Verbruggen starts but has Mark Flekken and Robin Roefs as excellent back up options. In defense Virgil van Dijk will hold things together with Jan Paul van Hecke and Micky van de Ven either side of him. Denzel Dumfries, Frenkie de Jong, Cody Gakpo and Memphis Depay are all so important to this Dutch side, with 15 of their 26 players playing in the Premier League.
Japan team news, focus
There are plenty of extremely dangerous forwards Japan rely on to share the attacking load with Daizen Maeda, Ayase Ueda, Ritsu Doan, Takefusa Kubo and Koki Ogawa all sharing around the goalscoring responsibility. Captain Wataru Endo couldn’t recover from injury in time for this tournament which is a big blow, but Japan have so many solid midfield options with Crystal Palace’s Daichi Kamada and Leeds United’s Ao Tanaka set to play big roles.
Netherlands vs Japan prediction
This could easily be a draw but it feels like it could be an upset, of sorts, with Japan catching the Dutch out on the break. Netherlands 1-2 Japan.
Discover more from NAIRAVOICE.COM.NG
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
