Giovanni van Bronckhorst says Feyenoord must keep their tactical discipline after the first hour, after a pattern in which strong starts have turned into wasted control. Before the match against Cambuur, he said the side is creating enough to finish games earlier, but is losing its grip when the match opens up.
That matters now because Feyenoord have already let games drift in the final half-hour against Sparta and Go Ahead Eagles. Van Bronckhorst said they did enough in the first 1 hour to “kill” both matches, then failed to do it. The next test comes with Cambuur, where another slow collapse would turn a familiar complaint into a real problem.
Van Bronckhorst pushed back on the easy explanation. The issue, he said, is not the physical side, because Feyenoord actually run more and sprint more in that later phase than before. What breaks down is structure. They sometimes press with the wrong players, leave other positions exposed and make poorer choices on the ball, and once that starts, the whole team loses control.
He also framed the problem as part of a team still being assembled. Feyenoord, he said, are an eleven in development, with many new players, a new trainer and partly a new staff. That makes some adjustment unavoidable. Even so, he pointed to one number that cuts against the idea of a blunt attacking side. Feyenoord create the most chances from open play of all clubs, which suggests the front end is working. The trouble is what comes after.
That is why the late minutes now carry more weight than the early spell. Van Bronckhorst said Sem Steijn and Oussama Targhalline remain important players, while Luciano Valente and Gjivai Zechiël are currently filling the role of Sem Steijn. He also said the switch that moved Charles Vanhoutte aside and used Zechiël as the most defensive midfielder after Steijn came on was probably not one Feyenoord will repeat often. In his view, that was the kind of reshuffle that can look neat on paper and still leave the team out of shape once pressure rises.
There is still a clear point of confidence in his assessment. He said Feyenoord have the chances to settle matches much earlier, and that when they do not, they are left to go “full gas” twice in the same game. That is the real cost of the current pattern: not a lack of quality, but a failure to close the door when the game is there to be won. Against Cambuur, that is the difference Feyenoord have to prove they can handle.
