Netherlands Team

England Team

The fifth of November but certainly no fireworks from this England display. This was a poor game, relieved only by the fact that they managed to win it. They brought in new-cap Emlyn Hughes for this friendly international, a game to be used as part of the build-up towards the World Cup finals in Mexico in 1970. Hughes turned out to be one of the few successes of the night.

The game was one of highly-complicated and laborious passing-movements with very little thrust on the end of it all. Geoff Hurst and Francis Lee were too often left on their own up-front and the Dutch found it easy to contain them. However, England's 'trademark' of spirited teamwork was very much in evidence and there was certainly no lack of effort from Sir Alf Ramsey's players.

Although the usual ultra-efficiency was not 100-per-cent apparent, Bobby Moore was assured, Peter Bonetti made some acrobatic interceptions and Hughes positively revelled in playing for his country. But goal-chances were few and far between and the 300 or so England fans, reinforced by members of the Portland Squadron of the Royal Navy, which had just put in at Rotterdam, had very little to excite them.

Just before the interval, Colin Bell had Treijtel beaten with a header from Hurst's cross but the ball thumped against the bar before being cleared. A quarter of an hour into the second half, Bell had another clear opening after a cross from Martin Peters. Alas, he missed again.

Holland, with Cruyff their main threat, came back strongly as the game progressed. He and Rijnders created all the Dutch team's best attacks. With 15 minutes to go, Holland began to turn the screw in their quest for victory. Substitute Van Dijk shot straight at Bonetti from a good position, and then a dazzling run by Cruyff, which left four England defenders in his wake, ended with another shot straight at the goalkeeper.

With the klaxons and rockets roaring from a crowd which sensed a possible win, England, not for the first time in recent internationals, came back with the perfect answer, even if it was somewhat fortuitous. Only five minutes remained on the clock when Bobby Charlton gained possession. He miscued his attempted shot, but the ball ran invitingly into the path of Bell some ten yards from goal. The Manchester City man's third chance of the night had tis time fallen just right and he hit an unstoppable shot past Treijtel and into the roof of the net.

It was a dramatic ending to a game too-often stifled by the technicalities of the play, plus two very efficient defences. An interested spectator was the Brazilian manager João Saldanha, who was on a spying tour of Europe. He did see some things to admire and also, much to the joy of the British sailors, signed their Royal Ensign in a bar before the game.
  

Colin Bell scored the goal that defeated a Dutch team that played the more skilful football but without being able to provide the finishing touch to their impressive approach work.  Emlyn Hughes made a sound start to his England career at left-back. It was Guy Fawkes Day, but there were few fireworks from an England attack that too often put passes astray. The game was into its last five minutes when Bell netted the winning goal following a mis-hit shot by Bobby Charlton. It was deserved reward for an all-action display from Bell, who had earlier put a header against the bar. His energetic performance showed why his Manchester City coach Malcolm Allison had nicknamed him Nijinsky (after the race horse, not the ballet master). The talk among the England players after the match was the performance of young Ajax partners Rudi Krol and Johann Cruyff. The prediction was that we would be hearing a lot more about them.

Source Notes

TheFA.com
Voetbalstats.nl
Official matchday programme
ESPN Classic
Original newspaper reports
Rothman's Yearbooks
Mike Payne's England: The Complete Post-War Record (Breedon Books Publishing Company, Derby, U.K., 1993)
Norman Giller, Football Author
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CG