PSV coach Roger Schmidt has to pay for it again with Willy and René van de Kerkhof. ‘Their’ PSV won 3-1 against sc Heerenveen on Sunday, but the club icons do not understand the choices of the German coach.
“Everyone was outraged about the striker position of Mario Götze against Heerenveen”, Willy said on Monday morning in the radio program ‘Wakker!’ on Omroep Brabant. “I don’t understand it myself either. You saw that in the second half, when Götze ended up in midfield and there was a real striker in the front, it went much better. Then PSV ran over Heerenveen. It was a deserved victory, but the starting line-up was again very peculiar.”
René agrees with his brother. He thought PSV’s match against Heerenveen was a bit of a repeat of Thursday’s Europa League match against Israel’s Maccabi Tel Aviv. “Weak bite, again. It was so bad…”, the ex-international sighed. “Only the first goal, by Noni Madueke, was fantastic.”
According to the wing attacker, PSV has a striker problem. “Eran Zahavi is not in shape at the moment and that Carlos Vinicius has to play American football. He really does not come into his own at PSV. And in addition to this striker problem, we also have that goalkeeper problem.”
Willy nods: “That’s true, what René says. And then Schmidt and Yorbe Vertessen will eventually bring in a striker in the 89th minute. Well, that helps…”
But PSV still won in any case. RKC dropped two points against NEC last weekend. The team of coach Joseph Oosting led 1-0 in Nijmegen for a long time after a goal by Richard van der Venne, but saw the home team come alongside just before time via Jonathan Okita. As a result, RKC missed the opportunity to rise to the handsome eleventh place in the Eredivisie. Oostingh’s team is now thirteenth.
The grapes were also sour for the troubled Willem II last weekend. The team of trainer Fred Grim seemed to be on its way to a stunt against leader Ajax on Saturday. The game seemed to end in 0-0, but nine minutes before the end Jurriën Timber decided the game in Amsterdam’s favour.
“It’s a shame”, René looked back. “Willem II played a good game. Willem II had earned a point and then ‘we’ could have caught up a bit.”