This is how Xavi Hernández's signing for the Netherlands was conceived
After three weeks of meetings, the agreement was sealed this Wednesday in Marbella
BarcelonaThe signing of Xavi Hernández as the new coach of the Netherlands was sealed this Wednesday afternoon. After three weeks of meetings between Barcelona and Amsterdam, during which the sporting director of the Dutch football federation Nigel de Jong contacted the former Barcelona coach to offer him the position, the definitive agreement was sealed in Marbella. After a few days on the Costa Brava, Xavi Hernández is with family and friends in this municipality on the Malaga coast. De Jong travelled there to sign the contract that has made the man from Terrassa the new coach of the Netherlands until the 2030 World Cup.
Following Ronald Koeman's resignation due to the premature elimination of the Dutch national team at the hands of Morocco (1-1, 2-3 on penalties) in the round of 16 of the World Cup, the orange federation did not want to delay much longer in presenting a new face on the bench. Xavi will be officially presented on August 25 in Amsterdam and will make his debut in an official match against Jürgen Klopp's Germany on September 24, on the first matchday of the Nations League. This competition will be the testing ground for the man from Terrassa's debut in international football, with the 2028 European Championship as the first major acid test for a Netherlands team that seeks to once again play recognizable football with the school of Johan Cruyff and Rinus Michels, as two of its great exponents, and to be competitive again in major tournaments.
In fact, Xavi's narrative – and his footballing philosophy (positional play, attacking teams that dominate possession, attacking football...) – align with the fact that both the Dutch federation and the Catalan coach have decided to join forces. "Without Johan Cruyff at Barça, a player like Xavi would surely not have had the career he did. Louis van Gaal gave him his debut and with Frank Rijkaard he blossomed," they explain to ARA from the man from Terrassa's circle.
In fact, fate would have it that Xavi's debut precisely in a friendly against the Netherlands as a player for the Spanish national team was in 2000 and that his last professional match in national team football was also against the Dutch: it was a defeat (1-5) in the second match of the group stage of the 2014 World Cup. Before that, Xavi had also been the executioner of the orange team in the final of the 2010 World Cup. Now, the Terrassa-born player becomes the first non-Dutch coach to manage the Netherlands national team in 48 years. The last one was the Austrian Ernst Happel in 1978.
Xavi Hernández prioritized managing a national team
Xavi hadn't managed a team for almost two years, although he has received interest from various clubs along the way. As ARA can reveal, among the clubs that have inquired about the Egara-born player's situation during all this time – this does not mean making an offer – are: Ajax – they were the first – Manchester United, Chelsea, Tottenham, Newcastle, West Ham, Nottingham Forest, Borussia Dortmund, Bayern Leverkusen, Leipzig, Benfica and Porto, among other more exotic offers such as from Mexican football or from the Persian Gulf countries.
However, the Egara-born player was clear that if he were to take the reins of a dugout again, what would motivate him most was managing a national team. After a traumatic end at Barça, he decided he needed to stop and rest: between his playing career and his time as a coach, he hadn't stopped for more than two decades.
Once this sabbatical year was over, he began to consider the option of returning to coaching, but a national team. Xavi does not want to leave Barcelona permanently, where he is focused on his family and raising his two children. This decision, focused on the more personal sphere, helps to understand why he has preferred national team football. According to this newspaper, one of the projects that most attracted the coach was that of the Moroccan national team. After Walid Regragui's resignation in March, the coach who led the African team to the semi-finals of the Qatar 2022 World Cup, Xavi's name came back into the spotlight. The Moroccan national team contacted him to make a splash after Regragui's departure following the defeat in the Africa Cup final.
But Xavi did not want to take on the reins of the Moroccan team with so little preparation time before the 2026 World Cup. The coach's intention at the time was to start a project from scratch and with long-term planning. That is to say, leading the new World Cup cycle from 2026 to 2030, as the Netherlands has offered him. The door to Morocco remained half-open, depending on what happened with Mohamed Ouahbi, who took charge after having managed the North African under-20 team. This Belgian of Moroccan parents managed the senior team at the World Cup, with a contract until 2030, and Morocco ratified their confidence in him after this summer's World Cup. With the Morocco option ruled out, other national teams became interested in Xavi, with the Netherlands being the chosen option.