One of the only good things about the international break from a Real Madrid perspective is that we get to see our players, especially those that struggle at the club, break out of their shell and put in a great shift with their national teams.
Denzel Dumfries is one of those players. Jose Mourinho has entrusted the Dutch right-back with the starting spot, and though Dumfries has worked hard and done well-intentioned things throughout the first
few games, his end product has been clunky, and his defense hasn’t been reliable.
Maybe you can chalk that up to him being in a new league and needing time to get himself acclimatized — at least that’s what you would hope.
Seeing Dumfries today in the Nations League vs Germany was a good reminder of how good he can be:
In Xavi Hernandez’s first game in charge (funny enough, against Jurgen Klopp who was making his Germany debut), Dumfries was deployed in his nominal right-back position, and was active as a two-way engine on the wing.
The Netherlands were fun to watch, and pinned Germany for large stretches of the game, making them look very ordinary. Dumfries, by nature of the Dutch scheme, was able to get into advanced zones frequently. The above heat map only shows his touches on the ball, but doesn’t show how many times he bombed up the pitch off the ball, creating important overloads and under-loads to create space for Crysencio Summerville on the right:
Dumfries was very unlucky not to have an assist in the 65th minute, when he received the ball in the right half space, held off his defender with impressive strength, carried the ball through, and put the ball on a platter for Mexx Meerdink who missed a sitter:
Dumfries ended the night with three key passes and a game-high three interceptions. He read passing lanes well, had timely step-ups, and maybe my favourite bullet point: He was very vocal and combative against the Germans — showing real character throughout the match.
The Netherlands may feel a little hard done by not to get more than one point in today’s Group B clash. They completely dominated the second half, had more than double the shots (22 vs 10), and had they been more clinical, would’ve won this game.
