The Netherlands Ponders the Possible: ‘We Can Beat Them’

Once the players had finished their news media commitments, they walked past the assembled journalists with looks of suitably solemn professionalism; as soon as they saw their colleagues, though, they broke into broad, beaming smiles, offering high fives and hugs, no longer able to conceal their disbelief. They were planning a party in the team hotel that night. “Just something among ourselves,” van der Gragt said. “We are so proud of this team that a party is good today. And then on Thursday, we will start to look forward.”

That desire to acknowledge, and to celebrate, what they have already achieved should not be confused with a satisfaction that their journey is at an end. The Netherlands will not return to the Stade de Lyon on Sunday content to act as extras in an American drama. Its players are not here to provide a guard of honor for the United States.

They recognize, of course, that the United States will be “favorite,” as Roord said. “They are a massive team, with massive players, the biggest team in the world,” said Jackie Groenen, scorer of the goal that carried the Netherlands past Sweden. But there is no inferiority complex here.

Groenen is a fine example of that: She wears the number 14 on her jersey, Cruyff’s number, an almost sacred artifact in Dutch soccer. She is not cowed by that legacy so much as inspired by it. Likewise, she is not cowed by the United States, either. She has, she said, pictured what it would look like, what it would feel like, to beat an opponent of that magnitude, to become a world champion.

The Dutch have every reason to aim high. Though they regard themselves — in Groenen’s words — as “down to earth” in a way that their feted opponents, perhaps, are not, they are, to quote van der Gragt, “not a small team.”