PSV has seen the chances of the championship shrink further. Ruud van Nistelrooij’s team did not go further than 1-1 in the away match against Vitesse. The team therefore remains in fourth place and saw the gap to Feyenoord increase to eight points. Van Nistelrooij does not want to give up the title fight yet, but does acknowledge that the chances are getting smaller. “When I look at the score, I don’t draw hard conclusions yet. But soft ones,” Van Nistelrooij said to ESPN after the game.
“Everyone is sick and tired of not winning here,” said Van Nistelrooij, who thought that PSV played “one of the fewest games this season” in Arnhem. Xavi Simons spoke afterwards of a mentality that needs to be changed: “After the early 1-0 for us, we thought: it will be all right. But that is simply not possible,” said Simons.
PSV took the lead early in the Gelredome through Simons, but then failed to push through. Simons was able to walk unhindered towards the goal from the center line, simply cut defender Nicolas Isimat-Mirin and pushed the ball past goalkeeper Kjell Scherpen. It meant his thirteenth goal of the season for the 19-year-old attacker.
The team from Eindhoven had control over the game before the break, but managed to create few opportunities. Shortly before the break, Fábio Silva headed on the outside of the post.
At the start of the second half, De Jong had two opportunities to double the lead. The PSV captain first shot wide from a distance and moments later had the ball up close before tapping in from a corner kick by Joey Veerman. However, the ball bounced over the crossbar via De Jong’s knee.
It turned out to be an expensive miss, because a few minutes later Vitesse equalized. A free kick from the right flew into the goal via PSV player Ibrahim Sangaré: 1-1.
“We got bogged down in passing the ball around. It was a bit passive.”
A final offensive from the excited PSV failed to materialise. An example was a shot in the last seconds by Sangaré, which flew very high over the goal.
Van Nistelrooij: “We should have pushed through after a great opening phase and our goal. But that didn’t happen. We got bogged down in passing the ball around. It was a bit passive,” said the trainer. “In the second half we just didn’t show enough and didn’t create anything from the game. And then you get a goal that we initiated ourselves. I am very disappointed in the level we reached today.”
