Advocaat wants more risks

Late equaliser
That tactic paid off when Ruud van Nistelrooij hooked home a late equaliser from Andy van der Meyde's cross to cancel out Torsten Frings' first-half free-kick. Still, Advocaat saw plenty of room for improvement. "The players should have shown more," he said. "Just knocking the ball around is not good enough for a Dutch international. That is something I can help the team improve on."

Seedorf boost
Advocaat received good news today when midfield player Clarence Seedorf - who missed last night's match - came through a midday training session at the team's Albufeira base. Seedorf had been suffering with a hamstring injury but is now in contention for the Netherlands' second Group D game against Czech Republic on Saturday.

Desire
"We now have to look back at what happened against Germany and see what we can do with a mind to our next match," Advocaat said. "Everyone's desire is there, that's for sure. I have already seen it in training but it's another matter entirely to be able to perform like that on the pitch."

Van Nistelrooij praised
The coach also had words of praise for Van Nistelrooij, who was under pressure to produce having been preferred to Patrick Kluivert, Roy Makaay and Pierre van Hooijdonk as the lone striker. "Ruud has now shown that he is able to score an important goal in a very bad match," he said.

Good feeling
Van Nistelrooij admitted that he feared the worst before he stole in ahead of his marker, Christian Wörns, to hook home the equaliser. "We were all broken," he said, before praising the Dutch fans who urged their team on at the Estadio do Dragão. "As a team, we fought for that goal and with the support of the fans we equalised. We have a good feeling now after the first match."