Tuesday, 14th October, 2014
Former Rangers star Ronald de Boer believes the Netherlands should have moved to appoint Ronald Koeman as coach in succession to Louis van Gaal, rather than Guus Hiddink.
Van Gaal stood down after leading the Netherlands to third place at the World Cup and took over at Manchester United, with Hiddink being drafted in as his replacement to guide the country to Euro 2016 in France.
The Netherlands have made a poor start to their attempt to qualify for Euro 2016, losing two out of their opening three qualifiers, the latest being last night in Iceland, a 2-0 defeat.
For De Boer, appointing Hiddink was a big mistake and the Dutch FA should have gone for Koeman, who is now at Premier League side Southampton.
"I think Guus Hiddink doesn't really have a game plan in my eyes. He doesn't show the guys 'this is the way we want to go.' I want to see, for example, running midfielders supporting [Robin] van Persie. I don't see any of this", he was quoted as saying by ITV.
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"There's plenty of games to play and change it around. But the pressure will be enormous now for Guus because there was criticism of his appointment beforehand.
"Koeman was ready to take over, he was really outspoken, he really wanted to take the job. With all due respect to Hiddink, he's 67 years old, I think he's done, in my eyes.
"Of course he has a great record. [But] his ideas now are old-fashioned. With Koeman he showed with Feyenoord he can really shape [a team] and also he knows the mentality of those young boys.
"Guus is more of a people manager with an arm around them. But those guys need guidance."
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