At 22:00 the Netherlands will face Spain at the Itaipava Arena Forte Nova within the Mundial group stage. That will be the battle between two sides, which featured in the 2010 contest final in South Africa.
At their pre-match press conferences both head coaches showed respect to the opponent and defined their priorities.
Vicente del Bosque (Spain): “I really respect van Gaal, he’s done a great job since he took charge of the team. The forthcoming match will be difficult for us”.
Louis van Gaal (the Netherlands): “Spain is first in the world football rating and the Netherlands – only fifteenth, but it doesn’t mean that the result of the forthcoming match is already clear. We are ready for the tournament”.
Oranje leader Arjen Robben has stated that the Netherlands performers have analyzed Spain play properly: “Of course, the game against Spain will be special. They are probably the best team of the world. They have a lot of outstanding players. Anyway we’ve analyzed their play”.
Spain experienced keeper Iker Casillas has told about his team’s task for the game: “It’s very important to win against Oranje. I know Robben very well as he featured for Real Madrid for two years. He can decide the game by himself”.
Officials of the match will be Italians headed by Nicola Rizzoli.
43-year-old Rizzoli has been refereeing Serie A matches since 2002 and international games – since 2007.
As for the arena, where the forthcoming game will take place, it should be mentioned that worthy stadium was built in Salvador after the previous World Cup in Brazil. 20 years later it was reconstructed. It had a capacity of 110,000. In 2007 over 60 thousand spectators were present at the arena as one of the stands ruined and 7 people died. After that it was decided to erect the new stadium.
Today it has a capacity of 48,747.
Finally we’ll quote FC Dynamo Kyiv Dutch forward Jeremain Lens: “After years of hard work my dreams come true”. So, let’s wish him success tonight.
