Austria v. Netherlands -I delayed this as long as possible.

What can you say about a game like that. I’m a teacher and I was watching the game while my students played games in homeroom. I screamed like an idiot when Ivanschitz scored the opening goal.

By the time they scored the second goal I knew something was wrong. I knew the Dutch just weren’t going to let that happen to them. It’s like Ulysses and the Cyclops. If you hit him right in the eye, you just may take him down. But if you pester him, he will wake up, gather his strength and tear you apart.

It just shows how important a great holding midfielder is to a game. Both teams lacked one, and then you end up with every coaches nightmare (and I mean this for both teams). No coach wants a score like that. Van Basten can be happy that he got a W, but I’m sure he was disappointed that his team let three go in.

As for the Austrians, thank goodness for Ivanschitz. May he stay healthy, strong, and bold. A great keeper may have blocked his shot, but no one could stop his courage and positive effect on the team. Hoffmann who?

I’m not going to say anything right now about the need for Paul Scharner. When Stranzl comes back, that would already help the defensive side of the team immensely.

I think everyone can agree on how important Harnik has been for this new Austrian team. Let’s all hope that with Bremen’s troubles up front, Harnik will get more time. He’s already very good, but with playing time he could be a real difference-maker.

ps Austria might be able to profit by changing their tactics. Good teams generally don’t have their key offensive players lying right in the middle of the field without serious defensive coverage. Look at Kaka in Milan. He can only do what he does because he is the only offensive midfielder in the line up. Even Seedorf knows he needs to play defensively to compensate for Kaka’s freedom. Austria has the players to do this too, I just don’t know if they will.

Peter