Netherlands vs Iceland Preview

The Netherlands will look to make it back-to-back wins at De Kuip when they welcome Iceland to Rotterdam this Monday.

Ronald Koeman’s men bounced back from their defeat to Germany last time when they beat Canada 4-0 on this ground. Goals from Memphis Depay, Jeremie Frimpong, Wout Werghost and Virgil van Dijk sealed the win ensuring that the Netherlands maintained their decent run at home.

They have been dominant at home recently, winning five of their last six games without conceding a goal (L1). They will be desperate to beat Iceland here as it will help them avenge a pair of defeats against Iceland which contributed to their failure to qualify for the 2016 Euros.

That said, the Oranje haven’t lost a single H2H encounter besides those two (W9, D1, L2) and remain heavy favourites to make it double figures in the W column despite failing to win six of their last ten friendly encounters (W4, D4, L2).

Meanwhile, Iceland may have missed out on European qualification this summer, but they are in decent form. The visitors continued their decent run of form with an incredible 1-0 win over Euro 2024 favourites England.

That famous success only improved their recent record in friendlies to three wins in their last seven (D1, L3), with their other two victories in that run coming against Guatemala and Honduras. However, despite Iceland’s shock win over England, their last six away games have produced two defeats (W4) against other strong European opponents in Ukraine and Portugal, thus raising the question of their consistent effectiveness against highly-rated European opponents.