Euro 2024: Room for attacks? Why the Dutch plan could work for England

The Dutch are somewhat unbalanced most of the time, with their right-back Denzel Dumfries pushing forward as often as possible.

Steven Bergwijn, who has started the last few games in this team, has moved closer and closer to Memphis Depay and Xavi Simons, who has really impressed me in the number 10 role.

They obviously pose a threat with their combination play, but on the other hand, if Dumfries charges forward he will give England some space to break through once they lose the ball.

This could leave Stefan de Vrij a little isolated. Although he is a very experienced defender, he is not as quick as Virgil van Dijk or Micky van de Ven. There should be some chances to expose him.

The other area where I think England could enjoy Dortmund is in central midfield.

England have a lot of players who like to get in front of the opposition defence – Jude Bellingham and Phil Foden, for example – whatever system we use.

The Dutch will have to do without Frenkie de Jong, Teun Koopmeiners and Marten de Roon at this European Championship due to injury, so they are missing several top players in these positions.

Jerdy Schouten and Tijjani Reijnders, who play in the Dutch midfield, are both really elegant, technically skilled footballers, but they like to have the ball and I wouldn’t describe them as defensively minded.

They fill gaps and get the job done when their team doesn’t have the ball, but they are not the same type of player as Declan Rice and that is not their strength.

In front of them, Simons tends to push forward, so there should be plenty of opportunities to get around Schouten and Reijnders and get close to the Dutch defense.

There have been some rumours that Koeman might change his formation for the game against England and challenge Southgate’s team by playing with three defensive lines.

However, due to the Dutch style of play, it ended more as a three-pointer anyway, as Dumfries came so far so early in an unusual way.

When that happens, Nathan Ake steps in and then they have him, Van Dijk and De Vrij as a three, and their system actually ends up being very similar to the one England used against Switzerland anyway.

Cody Gakpo is more of a left winger than a left full-back, but he gives them width on that side, just like Bukayo Saka did on the right for England against Switzerland because we didn’t pose the same threat on the other side of the pitch.

Both formations are a little unbalanced in this respect, as players on each wing have to take on different roles. In this scenario, the team with more possession tends to expose the other team’s weaknesses more quickly.

I expect a similar pattern to play out this time. One team will take control – probably England if they maintain possession as they have in previous games – and the other will have to adapt.

As I said at the beginning, what I like most about the Netherlands is that Koeman is not afraid to change things if something isn’t working.

For example, in the game against Austria, he brought on Simons for Joey Veermans after 35 minutes and pushed Lutsharel Geertruida, who was playing at right-back instead of Dumfries, into an inverted midfield position, changing the dynamic of the game, even if they still lost it in the end.

At half-time against Turkey, with the Dutch trailing 1-0, he essentially switched from a 4-3-3 to a 4-4-2 formation and put Wout Weghorst up front with Depay. This time they were the winners.

No matter how the Dutch line up at the start of the game, you can be sure that they will cause England different problems depending on what happens during the game.

Hopefully England won’t fall behind and have to react like that, but there will probably still be a moment in the game where they will have to make changes too.

This was definitely the case against Switzerland, when even before the Swiss took the lead, there was a feeling that Southgate needed to bring in a breath of fresh air.

This time, Koeman will not wait… and nor should he.

Danny Murphy spoke to Chris Bevan from BBC Sport in Berlin.