Veteran Dutch goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar enjoyed his greatest soccer moment last month when Manchester United won the Champions League trophy, but today he will be hoping to erase the memory of perhaps his lowest moment in a distinguished career.
Not that van der Sar could really be blamed as Italy overcame being reduced to 10-men early on in their Euro 2000 semi-final and ended up tieing the Dutch to 0-0 — the “Oranje” having missed unbelievably two penalties in regular time — and then winning on penalties.
For van der Sar — who along with Giovanni van Bronckhorst is the only other Dutch survivor from that match — it was a seminal moment.
“This match is one of the worst memories of my career,” said van der Sar, who experienced his first ever penalty shootout victory when United beat Chelsea in the Champions League final.
“And it was really traumatic for our supporters,” added van der Sar, who had to look on as Frank de Boer in particular had a nightmare as he missed one penalty in normal time and then another one in the shootout.
However, while van der Sar insists that today’s clash in the “Group of Death” is not a case of revenge, he still believes that they were the better side that day.
“The score was a flattering 0-0 for Italy,” van der Sar said. “We created most of the chances. We were the best team.”
Van der Sar, though, said it was traditional sadly for the Dutch to mess up in a penalty shootout — they also lost in one in the 1998 World Cup semi-finals to Brazil.
“Alas, penalty shootouts have rarely been a happy occasion for the Dutch,” van der Sar said. “Personally I have lived through four in my career and I have won only one.”
For van Bronckhorst it is also not a case of revenge either, though, the former Rangers, Arsenal and Barcelona midfielder turned defender remembers it as a really sad occasion.
“Eight years after the event, it would be ridiculous to talk of revenge,” van Bronckhorst said. “Most of the players are different from those that day. And the context of the match is different. At the time we were favorites. We had made a really good start to the tournament and we were playing in front of our supporters. On Monday, by contrast, we are going to play a team which are world champions and who are tipped to beat us. For a lot of our supporters the memory of 2000 is still vibrant. Like the defeats in the 1974 and 1978 World Cup finals [the first to the then West Germany and the second to Argentina], this match [2000] was interpreted to be a drama. But I do not feed off memories. Only the future interests me.”
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