Last week, both Robin van Persie and United new boy Daley Blind jetted off from Manchester to join up with the Netherlands national squad. Guus Hiddink, the successor of United boss Louis van Gaal, deployed a 4-3-3 formation against Italy; utilising Blind as a LB and van Persie as a lone striker. Up until the 35th minute, Blind had a passing success rate of 100%, and someone who looks composed on the ball is exactly what the Red Devils have lacked recently. Despite playing in the defence, Blind enjoyed pushing forward into the final third of the pitch, especially because his side were down to ten men within 10 minutes.
However, he often failed to make his trademark pass as the Italian defence pressured the Dutch perfectly. In the first half, neither player performed to their full ability due to the Italians completely dominating the game. The only real impact that the pair made in the match was when Blind nodded the ball on to van Persie in the 50th minute, but the out-of-form front man fired just wide with a decently struck volley. Overall, both players had an average game, with van Persie being probably the most disappointing player on the pitch.
Last night, the Dutch travelled to Prague to play their first Euro 2016 qualifier against Czech Republic. Once again, both van Persie and Blind started for Oranje, both in the same positions that they played in against Italy. Van Persie again was largely ineffective, but this time had a strike partner in Memphis Depay for a portion of the game and the two linked up well. RVP produced a perfectly weighted chip over the Czech defence which Narsingh failed to convert into a goal. In addition to this, he produced a spectacular spontaneous flick towards goal, which Petr Cech had to be on his toes to prevent.
Similar to the previous international game, Blind’s distribution was near perfect throughout and looked composed for a large portion of the game. However, he is not as useful pushed out at LB than he is in the heart of midfield as a defensive midfielder, resulting in the ball hardly finding his feet. Despite this, he did produce the assist for the Dutch’s only goal. He found himself in the final third of the pitch and delivered a perfectly weighted cross to Lazio defender Stefan de Vrij who headed the ball into the far corner of the net.
Although Blind was played out of his favoured position, his performances were consistent and he made little mistakes with the ball at his feet. His United teammate van Persie however, performed very poorly over the two games and contributed little to either. He had a few golden opportunities to score and failed to turn any into goals. There are some questions still left to be answered; where will Blind play for United? And is Robin van Persie starting to decline? Hopefully those questions will be answered when the Reds reunite to face QPR on Sunday.