It seems the Dutch media still haven’t forgiven Matthijs de Ligt for his recent ‘mediocre’ displays in a national shirt despite his scoring display for Manchester United against Southampton on Saturday. De Ligt, who signed for the Premier League club from Bayern Munich for a £43m fee this summer, was one of his side’s standout performers in the 3-0 win at St Mary’s.
And his afternoon was capped by his first goal for his new club, heading home a Bruno Fernandes cross in the first half before later strikes from Marcus Rashford and Alejandro Garnacho sealed matters.
It meant a positive end to an otherwise difficult week for De Ligt, who turned in a nightmare display as Netherlands drew 2-2 with Germany in the UEFA Nations League on Tuesday.
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At fault for both the German goals, the 25-year-old was hauled off at half time by manager Ronald Koeman. It followed him also making an error in the 5-2 weekend win over Bosnia, with Koeman later calling the player out in his post-match press conference.
"He did not get his footwork right,” he said, after De Ligt failed to track Edin Dzeko before the veteran striker scored Bosnia’s second goal. “It was a bad individual moment for a defender. You have to learn from that, it is clear that these kinds of moments need to be improved.”
Due to his international displays, there were question marks as to whether Erik ten Hag would take his compatriot out of the firing line for Saturday’s Premier League game and favour picking Harry Maguire. De Ligt’s only previous United start had come in the 3-0 defeat by Liverpool.
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But his decision to keep faith proved justified, even if journalists back home weren’t prepared to let his poor displays in orange go just yet. Voetball Zone said: “Matthijs de Ligt has somewhat avenged himself in the first half of the duel between Southampton and Manchester United for his two mediocre performances in the Dutch national team.”
The Algemeen Dagblad newspaper also references the Bosnia and Germany games, despite describing De Ligt as his side’s ‘standout performer’ on Saturday. “The scoring Matthijs de Ligt played a strong match and took revenge for his two poor matches last week in the shirt of Oranje,” they wrote.
Het Parool added he showed the kind of form which persuaded Juventus to pay £63million to take him from Ajax back in 2019 . “Against Southampton, Matthijs de Ligt finally played with freedom and suddenly full of confidence,” the outlet said.
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The centre back actually limped off before the final whistle, but confirmed afterwards he was only suffering with minor cramp. And he vowed to continue to improve with more game time under his belt.
“I was happy I played one and a half (for Holland), it's a long time since I played games,” he said. “This is my third game in a week. For me it's important to get rhythm and I can show a little more what I can do."
