Netherlands beats Kazakhstan to stay in race for Euro 2016

It would be “a great feeling, later” to reflect on reaching triple figures, Van Persie said, as he prepared for the very long journey home from Astana, Kazakhstan, his Holland having won 2-1 in their penultimate Euro2016 qualifier.

With the win, Holland (13 points) moved one point ahead of Turkey, who square off in Group A action on Saturday night against the Czech Republic in Prague, in the battle to earn a spot in the qualifying playoff for Euro 16 to be played in France. Islambek Kuat scored a consolation goal with the last touch of the match.

Kazakhstan drew its last qualification match 0 – 0 with Iceland.

Turkey pushed the Dutch back to fourth thanks to a 62nd-minute penalty by Selcuk Inan and Hakan Calhanoglu’s strike with 10 minutes left against the Czech Republic. Even so, Blind’s men held on to climb into third – temporarily at least – a point above play-off rivals Turkey.

Good luck to Newcastle’s Dutch contingent in this second half. We have to win two games. The Dutch need a few extraordinary luck and an improbable favour from Iceland if they are not to miss out on their first major tournament since Van Gaal failed to guide them through qualifying for the 2002 World Cup. “That was the aim and how it happened didn’t matter”.

Blind gave Kenny Tete, Virgil van Dijk, Anwar El Ghazi and Jeroen Zoet their global debuts in the Group A encounter and he was impressed with the performances of Southampton defender Van Dijk and Ajax fullback Tete.

In reference to the two injured goalkeepers, the 32-year-old added: “What is worse is that Tim Krul is likely to have a serious knee injury and Jasper Cillessen is also out”.

“We struggled a bit from there on due to their opportunistic style of play”.

The Netherlands then increased its lead a few minutes after half-time when midfielder Wesley Sneijder received a pass from striker Klaas Jan Huntelaar down the left side and fired a shot into the roof of the goal. El Ghazi was denied a maiden goal moments later as Yuri Krasnozhan’s charges cleared his attempt off the line.