Is Dutch football returning to its glory days?

It was as recent as the 2017/18 season. The Netherlands had just finished a woeful campaign with none of its five representatives making it past the group stages in either the Champions League or the Europa League.

In fact, only Feyenoord and Vitesse even advanced out of the playoffs and actually made the group stages (Feyenoord winning once and losing five times in the Champions League; Vitesse posting a 1-2-3 record in Europa League).

That was the Netherlands’ worst collective European performance in recent times.

However, flash forward three seasons and the Dutch clubs are having a remarkable start in Europe which now includes a brand-new club competition.

Dutch clubs proving to be a force in European competitions

So far, the Dutch have the most coefficient points of all national associations this season — a little more on that later — with all five of their representatives in the group stages, something not achieved since 2004/05 when the Europa League was known as the UEFA Cup.

With a considerable improvement over the last several seasons, it begs the question, is Dutch football seeing a revival in their domestic football?

Dutch football has largely been very successful over the last half century with the national team reaching the World Cup final on three occasions and lifting the Euros trophy in 1988. On the club front, a Dutch team has won the European Cup/Champions League on six occasions: Ajax claiming four, while PSV and Feyenoord have won one each. The same three have each won the UEFA Cup/Europa League as well, while Ajax have also won the now defunct Cup Winners Cup.

It has been nearly two decades since a Dutch team last lifted silverware in Europe (Feyenoord in the 2002 UEFA Cup), but there have been strong performances since. PSV reached the last four of the Champions League in 2004/05, with Ajax doing the same in 2018/19. The latter also reached the Europa League final in 2016/17, falling to Manchester United.

Looking at the general performances of Dutch football since the 2016/17 season, they have been reasonably solid. Excluding the previously mentioned 2017/18 campaign, they have had at least two teams reach a knockout round in three of the other four completed seasons (the one season they didn’t was the season Ajax last made the semifinals of the Champions League).

Dutch top all NAs in points

Back to my previous point on coefficients, UEFA have a system of determining how many teams from each country (i.e., national associations, or NA) qualify across the three club competitions. Each NA’s performances in the five most recent European campaigns – including the current one – are taken into account. This link provides the full breakdown on how teams earn points for their NAs.

With the exception of Ajax, who won the Eredivisie last season, each Dutch club had to play at least one round of qualifying over the summer. In the Champions League playoffs, PSV breezed past Galatasaray and Midtjylland before narrowly losing out to Benfica. That loss sent them to the Europa League group stage.

AZ meanwhile fell in the Europa League playoffs to Celtic in August, sending the Alkmaar-based side to the Europa Conference League. Feyenoord and Vitesse both played in UEFA’s newest club competition, the former successfully negotiating three rounds to make the group stage, the latter surviving only two rounds. This makes The Netherlands the only national associations outside of the Big 5 to have a full complement of teams across the group stages of all UEFA club competitions

This season, the Netherlands have amassed a remarkable 9.400 points (10.600 when taking into account the bonus points already guaranteed) which is the most of all NAs at the time of writing. With Ajax winning their UCL group with two games to spare, while Feyenoord and AZ are already guaranteed a top two finish in their Europa Conference League groups, things are looking promising for a very long season of football for these clubs.

PSV are third in their Europa League group and are almost guaranteed to see European football in the spring, while Vitesse are also third but in their Europa Conference League group, meaning they will need two wins in their last two games to ensure progression. Neither scenario is impossible but four out of five clubs still playing football in February is not something to be laughed at. The last time Netherlands had three or more clubs extend their European campaigns past December was in 2014/15.

Looking at the current starting positions for the NA coefficients next season, Netherlands will start the season in sixth, and should they end the season in that very position, they would have three Champions League spots just in time for the new Champions League format in 2024. That would mean six European spots for the Dutch, something that hasn’t happened since 2015/16.

Regardless of how the rest of this season pans out, this has been a blistering start. The numbers accrued by the Dutch clubs, especially at this point, are highly impressive. Just getting to 10 coefficient points for the season for a non-Big 5 nation is quite the task.

Could this season be a turning point for Dutch football, the start of some new glory days?