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Originally Posted by demonrail666
Right now I wouldn't fancy their chances against Germany or Holland or even France or Italy. Argentina need to up their game too if they want to ensure this isn't the first Sth American WC won by a European side.
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Agreed on Germany, but let's not get carried away by the Dutch result on Friday. Expectations were really low beforehand and when I said I would celebrate a goalless draw with Spain last week I sure wasn't joking. Despite that one freak scoreline Brazil would still be the big favourites, should the teams meet.
Thiago Silva alone costs about the same as the entire Dutch backline. Cillessen, Janmaat, De Vrij, Martins Indi and Blind all play in the Dutch league where they are used to defending against the likes of Aron Johannsson, not Neymar et al. Most of them have barely played any European games and none of them has appeared at a big tournament before.
So far we've seen Brazil being able to collect the points without playing well, knowing they can do better. We've yet to see the Dutch on an average day or, god forbid, a bad one. The team is heavily relying on Robben and Van Persie up front and the Dutch central defense looks vulnerable when put under pressure. Hence the 5-3-2 switch by Van Gaal after Strootman's injury, but the Dutch have only played 3 games in that system so far and the first one was less than a month ago. Martins Indi, De Vrij and Janmaat have played it at Feyenoord though... their manager Ronald Koeman has used the same system a few times since January.
But first it's Australia, one game at a time.
I'm really curious to see Del bosque's plans for the Chile game as well.