Holland’s Warm-up game against Australia wasn’t the happiest moment of their lives for both Duthc players and fans: three of their important players left the field injured. The players are Phillip Cocu, Wesley Sneijder and Giovanni van Bronckhorst.

Australia showed the world how to stop the Netherlands at the forthcoming FIFA World Cup™ with a battling 1-1 draw in Rotterdam on Sunday.

The Dutch took a first-half lead through Manchester United forward Ruud van Nistelrooij but the Socceroos hit back after the break with Tim Cahill smashing home a rebound after Mark Viduka’s penalty came back off the woodwork.

See the highlights of the game finished 1-1 here:

Dutch coach Marco van Basten described Sneijder’s injury as serious. “Sneijder is limping and his ankle is strapped up,” Van Basten told reporters. “We’ll have to wait 24 hours to find out how serious it is. We have to wait and see how it develops.”

Netherlands, who started with their first-choice team, opened the scoring after nine minutes when Andre Ooijer’s shot was blocked by goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer and Ruud van Nistelrooij netted the rebound.

The hosts, with wingers Arjen Robben and Robin van Persie in good form, played well but wasted several scoring chances.

Van Basten said he would wait until Wednesday before deciding whether to replace Rafael van der Vaart. Midfielder van der Vaart, who had ankle surgery in April, suffered a new ankle injury in training last week.

“If we replace him, the most logical step is that we call up a player from the U-21 squad,” said Van Basten.

The Netherlands start their FIFA World Cup campaign against Serbia and Montenegro in Leipzig next Sunday. Australia’s opening game is against Japan in Kaiserslautern on 12 June.

For Australia it was a morale-boosting result on the territory of FIFA’s number three rated country, but that could not mask the gulf in class at times. In the first half, Viduka cut a lonely figure up front on his own with midfielders unable to reach him quickly enough to offer support.

Australia could not match the speed of the Dutch wingers, nor the creativity of a midfield superbly marshalled by the excellent Sneijder. But Schwarzer played a blinder and could have earned himself a start ahead of Zeljko Kalac when Australia kick off their campaign against Japan.

Source: WCoffsite