The Dutch national team qualified for the Final Eight of the Nations League on Saturday with a 4-0 victory over Hungary. The best news of the evening, however, came from Hungarian assistant national coach Ádám Szalai, whose condition is stable after a worrying medical accident.
The Netherlands and Hungary were only seven minutes into the match when panic broke out on the Hungarian bench. Assistant national coach Szalai became unwell and urgently needed medical attention. After minutes of treatment, Szalai regained consciousness and was able to continue patching up in the dressing room before ultimately going to hospital for further examination. The Hungarian players indicated that they wanted to resume the match.
The first thing that had to be done was to study VAR images. Just before the strike, Tamas Nikitscher had received the ball in his arm, as people behind the scenes had noticed. Referee Jesús Gil Manzano gave a penalty and it was used by Wout Weghorst. The cheering in the Arena sounded a little less loud than normal. Just before half past nine, the Hungarian Football Association reported that Szalai’s situation is stable.
There was a lot of discussion about the way Weghorst celebrated his goal:
After the remarkable opening phase, the match was fairly up and down. The Netherlands – with Frenkie de Jong back in the team for the first time in more than a year – had more ball possession and had the most opportunities, but on the other side Hungary also threatened a few times. In the thirteen minutes of extra playing time, the Netherlands managed to get the match under control. Donyell Malen found Dénes Dibusz in his path with an acrobatic effort.
Shortly afterwards, Malen attracted attention again when he fooled Zsolt Nagy and was tagged. Malen went to the ground and Manzano pointed to the spot again. Weghorst seemed to be on his way to his second goal, but Cody Gakpo grabbed the ball from the striker. This was to the surprise and frustration of Ronald Koeman. In any case, Gakpo made no mistake and sent the Netherlands into the dressing room with a generous 2-0 lead.
The two penalties in the picture
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Shortly in the second half, Weghorst came very close to his second goal of the evening. The attacker’s shot exploded at the intersection. Hungary responded with a quick breakout, with the incoming Roland Sallai shooting the ball just wide. Moments later, Dominik Szoboszlai’s header also went past the wrong side of the post.
On the other side, Denzel Dumfries made the decision by making it 3-0 with a volley. This meant that Hungary’s resistance was broken. The Netherlands played the remainder of the match simply and just before the end, substitute Teun Koopmeiners added to his return with the 4-0.
Double good news
A defensively insecure-looking Dutch team achieved a fairly carefree victory and is assured of second place in the final ranking of the Nations League group. This means that the Netherlands, together with leader Germany, will go to the Final Eight of the tournament. In addition, Koeman’s team is now group leader in the draw for the World Cup qualifying cycle.
The Netherlands will close the group stage of the Nations League on Tuesday with an away match against Bosnia and Herzegovina. There is nothing at stake anymore for that match: the Netherlands can no longer rise or fall in the group, while Bosnia (which was beaten by Germany on Saturday) will end up at the bottom anyway. As a result, it is relegated to League B.
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