Cape Town — Though simply saying "The Dutch" will bring a smile to the lips of many a lifelong soccer fan, the reality is that the Dutch have made a national rule of faltering in the decisive phases of the World Cup.
They have been perennial fan favorites with their orange colors and their flashy players and their legacy with the catchy name: Total Football. But for all the Ruud Gullits and Marco van Bastens and Dennis Bergkamps they have fielded through the years, they have not been in a World Cup final since 1978.
That paradoxical state of affairs ended Tuesday night with a 3-2 victory over Uruguay in a South African city the Dutch helped build. It ended with a three-minute flurry of ball movement and scoring in the second half in which this Dutch team's stars lived up to their name recognition: with the playmaker Wesley Sneijder manufacturing a goal in the 70th minute with a firm shot through heavy traffic and with left wing Dirk Kuyt setting up the next goal in the 73rd with a cross that Arjen Robben headed off the inside of the left post.
That collective burst of creative energy pried open a semifinal that had been as tight as a clenched fist, with Uruguay's industrious midfielders sealing off the spaces and winning the bulk of the duels.
The Uruguayans, true to their spirit throughout this competition, did not go quietly, even with a lineup deeply diminished by injuries and the suspensions of defender Jorge Fucile and the star striker Luis Suárez. It was Suárez's deliberate handball on the goal line in the final moments of a quarterfinal match against Ghana that led to his expulsion but also allowed Uruguay to have the chance to win.
But there would be no hand of God or Suárez or any other Uruguayan player on Tuesday, and despite a goal in added time from defender Maximiliano Pereira that turned the closing moments into a scramble, the Netherlands held just firm enough to win.
"We survived, and we were just so relieved in the locker room," said Bert van Marwijk, the silver-haired Dutch coach. "It's quite something we've achieved after 32 years, and it's something I thought about toward the end on the bench. This is great, but the thing is we're not there yet."
The Netherlands and Spain are the strongest soccer nations never to win their sport's ultimate title. Both are still in contention here in what has turned into a European World Cup after all the early focus on Brazil and Diego Maradona's Argentina team.
In Sunday's final in Johannesburg, the Netherlands will face the winner of Wednesday's semifinal between Spain and Germany. Whichever wins the final will become the first European team to win the Cup outside of Europe, which is no great surprise considering the generally cool weather and similar time zone has made this competition feel less foreign than usual to Europe's top teams.
The Netherlands, though not on the list of clear favorites with Brazil and Spain before the tournament, is hardly a shock finalist. It won all its qualifying matches and all six of its matches in South Africa, including one against Brazil in the quarterfinals.
Though the Dutch continue to show occasional weakness on their back line and can lose their muse for extended periods, they have an abundance of weapons and a consensus-building coach in van Marwijk. They have clearly been a more explosive team with Robben, the Bayern Munich star, back in the lineup for the knockout round after his recovery from a hamstring injury.
Sneijder has been the most productive team member, however, and his goal on Tuesday was his fifth in the tournament, tying him with the Spanish striker David Villa for the goal-scoring lead.
But the goal of the night was scored by a Dutchman who scores them rarely: the defender and captain Giovanni van Bronckhorst, who was left free to shoot from about 40 yards in the 18th minute and responded with a beautiful left-footed strike that goalkeeper Fernando Muslera could only graze with his fingertips before it glanced off the post and into the upper right corner of the goal.
Uruguay's star striker Diego Forlán, one of the top players of the tournament, responded shortly before halftime with a long-range left-footed strike of his own that seemed to fool goalkeeper Maarten Stekelenburg as it soared over him.
Forlán later came close to giving Uruguay the lead after halftime with a curling free kick over a Dutch wall that forced Stekelenburg to dive quickly to his right. But according to Uruguay Coach Óscar Tabárez, Forlán was playing with an undisclosed injury, and Tabárez substituted for him in the 84th minute.
By then, the Dutch, with Rafael van der Vaart replacing the injured Demy de Zeeuw in midfield for the second half, had already gone on their three-minute run. Sneijder's goal, like so many in this Cup, generated debate, with Tabárez claiming that striker Robin van Persie was in an offside position when Sneijder struck his shot in van Persie's direction.
"The second goal I think was decisive because you see it and now you see of course that it was an offside, and that the match could have been different," Tabárez said.
Back home in Uruguay, Tabárez's compatriots curtailed office hours and reportedly postponed wedding ceremonies to watch the game. But this Uruguayan team, however valiant, will not equal the performances of the 1930 and 1950 teams that won the World Cup
The Dutch still have a chance to improve on their history, and they have four days to rest for their nation's most important game since the 1974 and 1978 finals. The Netherlands lost both to the home team: to Franz Beckenbauer and West Germany in 1974 and to Mario Kempes and Argentina in 1978.
But with their traveling horde of orange-clad fans, the Dutch may feel more like the home team this time.
