As Orange fever rises with every goal scored in the Dutch team’s Euro 2008 campaign, lawyers, housewives and school kids become crazed wig-wearing fans adorning their homes, bikes and even their pets in the national color.
Normally sedate suburban streets have been transformed into massive canvasses for row upon row of tiny, orange, fluttering flags. Window sills sport orange flowers — real and fake — and figurines with wild orange hair ahead of today’s quarter-final against Russia.
Many a home and office window displays a banner with the words: “Hup (Go) Holland,” and at least one fan has gone to the extent of draping his whole house in orange, a newspaper photograph showed.
PHOTO: EPA
Cars, bicycles and pet dogs are used to display the Dutch sense of soccer patriotism with flags, banners, miniature balls and unwitting four-legged fans dressed up in human-sized orange T-shirts.
And then there are the hats. Hats in the form of road traffic cones. Hats in the form of huge cheese wedges. Tall hats that come with drum sticks and can be used as musical instruments.
“It is a small country, with not so much to be proud of,” said Ruud Stokvis, sport psychologist at the Mulier Institute in the southern city of Hertogenbosch. “This is something that attracts the attention of the rest of the world. People are showing their Dutchness.”
While the Dutch are well-known for the intensity of their support, Stokvis says it is the numbers that are more astounding.
“In the Netherlands, we have more people interested in football, more soccer players in relation to our population, than probably any other country in Europe,” Stokvis said.
He said about one million people out of a population of 16 million, more than 6 percent, were active in soccer.
“Because of that, there is great involvement in what our soccer players are doing,” he said.
Retailers are certainly not complaining.
The Dutch are spending millions of euros of their hard-earned cash on such non-essentials as face paint and hooters.
Among the most popular is a T-shirt with the face of a benign-looking lion on the front, until a special flap is lifted to transform it into a roaring wild animal complete with sharp fangs.
One supermarket chain is presenting its customers with a small plastic toy lion with brush-able hair with every purchase over 15 euros. The lion is Holland’s national symbol.
An optometry chain has reported a surge in demand for its orange-framed glasses — both play and prescription.
Last week, tens of thousands of Dutch fans descended on the Swiss town of Bern for their team’s 4-1 thumping of France, despite many of them not having a ticket.
“It’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience,” said Dutch fan Nick Withag, one of the ticketless.
As churches open their doors to the soccer faithful, showing matches on big screens, and additional outdoor viewing areas are set aside around the country, the Dutch hospitality industry has warned that staff who call in sick can expect a check-up visit at home.
And for those further afield, broadcaster Radio Nederland announced it has bought extra frequencies to broadcast today’s quarter-final all around the world.,
ANFIELD BLUES: Kylian Mbappe arrived at Anfield on a run of 21 goals in 17 games, but he managed just three attempts in the match, none of them hitting the target Kylian Mbappe has been nearly unstoppable this season, but he hit a roadblock in their UEFA Champions League match at Anfield on Tuesday. For the second year running, the Real Madrid forward had a night to forget at Merseyside as Liverpool won 1-0. Mbappe looked a shadow of the player who has been tearing defenses apart all season. “We were lacking that threat in the final third,” said Madrid coach Xabi Alonso, without naming Mbappe individually. The FIFA World Cup winner for France rarely looked capable of finding a breakthrough against a Liverpool team who have been so defensively fragile for much of the
LOCAL SUCCESS: In the doubles, Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia defeated Italians Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini in straight sets Elena Rybakina on Monday punched her ticket to the WTA Finals last four with an impressive 3-6, 6-1, 6-0 victory over second seed Iga Swiatek in round-robin play in Riyadh. After cruising past Amanda Anisimova in her opener on Saturday, Rybakina claimed her second win of the week to guarantee herself top spot in the Serena Williams Group. Anisimova on Monday rallied back from a set and a break down to triumph 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 in her all-American battle with seventh seed Madison Keys, who has been eliminated from the competition. “Madi was playing so well, it was quite a battle out there,”
Erling Haaland on Sunday scored twice to propel Manchester City up to second in the English Premier League with a 3-1 win over AFC Bournemouth. The Cherries started the day in second thanks to the longest unbeaten run in the English top flight, but Andoni Iraola’s side were undone by the scintillating form of the Norwegian striker, who took his tally to 13 Premier League goals in 10 games. Haaland’s relentless streak is maintaining City’s title challenge as they reduced the gap to leaders Arsenal back to six points and edged one point ahead of Liverpool, who they face at the weekend. “Important
For almost 30 minutes, Vitomir Maricic did not take a breath. Face down in a pool, surrounded by anxious onlookers, the Croatian freediver fought spasming pain to redefine what doctors thought was possible. When he finally surfaced, he had smashed the previous Guinness World Record for the longest breath-hold underwater by nearly five minutes. However, even with the help of pure oxygen before the attempt, it had pushed him to the limit. “Everything was difficult, just overwhelming,” Maricic, 40, told reporters, reflecting on the record-breaking day on June 14. “When I dive, I completely disconnect from everything, as if I’m not even there.
RSS