Micky van de Ven has outlined the Netherlands’ plan to silence England’s Bukayo Saka forward of their Euro 2024 semi-final on Wednesday.
Tottenham Hotspur’s Van de Ven and Arsenal’s Saka are used to being rivals within the Premier League, however now the north London duo will face off on the worldwide stage because the Netherlands face England in Dortmund in a bid to earn a spot within the event closing.
And Van de Ven has already warned his crew to pay attention to star man Saka, who has impressed in Germany this summer time and will show an issue participant for Ronald Koeman’s aspect.
Talking forward of the highly-anticipated conflict, the defender mentioned: “Saka is a superb footballer with numerous tempo however [Virgil] van Dijk and [Nathan] Ake have quite a lot of tempo too and I’m positive they’ll deal with him.
“I do know Saka very nicely from him taking part in at Arsenal. I confronted him twice. We’ll see if the supervisor will begin me.”
Van de Ven has featured in 4 of his nation’s 5 fixtures at Euro 2024, coming off the bench to make an influence within the backline, however has not but made a begin.
When requested if he thought he may compete with the velocity of Saka, Van de Ven urged that he’s a faster participant, earlier than Cody Gakpo branded his teammate because the ‘quickest participant within the Premier League’.
Liverpool’s Gakpo continued: “This has been a really stunning event with our group. The sensation’s actually robust. We’re within the semi-final and this isn’t the tip of the event. Each single crew that’s right here needs to get to the ultimate and we’re no totally different.
“It isn’t for nothing that England are within the semi-finals. They’ve a extremely good group of gamers and it is a improbable squad. So it should hopefully be a fantastic recreation.”