Dutch footballers aspire to be crowned World Cup champions

The Dutch national team is going to the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 in the hope of winning their first World Cup title, after failing to qualify for the Russia 2018 World Cup; the eighth-ranked Oranje is one of the most successful teams in the World Cup tournaments to never win a World Cup title.The Netherlands comes to Doha with a group of young stars hoping to secure the Netherlands first World Cup, after reaching the finals 3 times and failing each time. The first was in 1974 against Germany, then in 1978 against Argentina, and most recently against Spain in 2010.The Dutch national team is participating in the World Cup for the 11th time. They only lost twice out of 30 group-stage matches, and the Dutch will be leaning on that bit of history when they play in the group stage of the Qatar World Cup.The Oranje are in Group A with hosts Qatar, African champions Senegal, and Ecuador. They will start their Qatar World Cup campaign by facing Senegal at Al-Thumama stadium on Nov 21, then the Ecuador at Khalifa International Stadium on Nov 25, before facing the host country at Al-Bayt stadium on Nov 29.The Dutch federation has chosen the Hyatt Regency Oryx Hotel as the team's residence during the tournament and will train at Mesaimeer SC stadium.The Dutch managed to reach the World Cup after missing the tournament by leading Group G in the European qualifiers for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022, which included Turkey, Norway, Montenegro, Latvia and Gibraltar.The team managed to reach the World Cup after collecting 23 points topping the group, followed by the Turkish team in second place with 21 points, the Norwegian national team was in 3rd place with 18 points, the Montenegrin national team in 4th place with 12 points, the Latvian national team in 6th place with 9 points, and last place was Gibraltar with no points.The Oranje have a new generation that includes Barcelona striker Memphis Depay, Bayern Munich defender Matthijs De Ligt, Liverpool defender Virgil Van Dijk, Roma midfielder Georginio Wijnaldum, Barcelona midfielder Frankie De Jong, Ajax attacking midfielder Davy Klaassen, among many other outstanding players.The confidence of the Dutch national team, which has reached the advanced stages on previous World Cup tournaments, lies in mastering the tactic of the "Total Football", based in its philosophy on the need for all the team's players to move around the field continuously without committing to their original positions, and it depends entirely on exploiting the spaces on the field, in a way that looks more like a plan in chess rather than football.The Total Football team continued to perform at high levels and was ranked first in the FIFA World rankings in 2011, becoming the second football team after Spain to top the ranking without having previously won the World Cup.The Dutch team has participated in the World Cup finals 10 times, during which it succeeded in reaching the final three times with no title, and came third at the 2014 Brazil World Cup, and fourth at the 1998 France World Cup, and qualified for the quarterfinals once and the round of sixteen twice, while in the first two participations it failed to skip the group stage.Given the history of the Netherlands national team, and its good balance of youth and experience, will the Dutch be the dark horse for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, and achieve its first title? At the European level, the Netherlands has appeared in the UEFA Nations League finals 10 times, the first of which was in 1976 in 3rd place, but the most notable result for the Oranje was winning the European Championship in 1988 in Germany.The Netherlands offered many football legends to the world, the most prominent of whom was Johan Cruyff, who won the Golden Ball in 1971, 1973 and 1974, and led his team to the first final in their history against Germany in 1974. Despite losing the World Cup, Cruyff was still crowned the best player in the tournament.After the 70s generation came two special ones in the nineties and the new millennium. They included players like Dennis Bergkamp, Edwin Van Der Sar, Arjen Robben, Robin Van Persie, Ruud Van Nistelrooy, Marco Van Basten, Ruud Gullit, Ronald Koeman, among many others.