“Unexpected”: A World Cup Final poem for Holland

“Unexpected”: A World Cup Final poem for Holland (as featured on Dutch radio station Radio Netherlands:

You always know what you’re going to get, watching Holland.
You’re going to get:
Orange.
Johann Cruyff in the crowd looking Very Solemn.
Long crossfield passes floating on the wind like pollen.
That’s what you get with Holland.

But this World Cup, Holland’s style feels different – it feels –
Foreign.
See, if this was 1974, we’d all be talking by now about how Holland put together thirty-three passes to score.
But now, Holland are like Germany:
They’re direct,
And they’ve moved to the final with efficiency and certainty.
Apart from Sneijder – God bless Wesley – the star man has been Dirk Kuyt.
We’re down to the last match,
And we’re still waiting for van Persie to pull the fireworks out.
I wonder what Rinus Michels would have thought.

But this World Cup has been hard-fought,
And it’s difficult to play the beautiful game
When you’re trying not to get bullied by Uruguay,
Or outskilled by Brazil.

So no; this is not the Holland that we know.
This is tough Holland.
Take the game by the neck’s-scruff-Holland.
But it doesn’t feel like Dutch Holland.
But – all the same – they deserve it.
Good luck, Holland.

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