The ECHO’s Chris Beesley continues his daily series of articles on Everton and the World Cup running throughout the tournament in Qatar.
Everton’s John Heitinga is a member of an exclusive club of just five footballers alongside Zinedine Zidane but unfortunately membership is based on being sent off in a World Cup final. Other than Ray Wilson, Heitinga is the only other player to date to turn out in a World Cup final while with Everton but while the 1966 left-back lifted the trophy on home turf at Wembley, the Dutchman not only tasted defeat but suffered the ignominy of being shown the red card in the biggest game of his life.
Along with the aforementioned Zidane – given his marching orders for headbutting former Blue Marco Materazzi when playing for France against Italy in 2006 – the others joining Heitinga in the World Cup finals ‘hall of shame’ are Argentinian pair Pedro Monzon and Gustavo Dezotti, who were both dismissed in 1990 against West Germany, and France’s Marcel Desailly against Brazil in 1998, the only one on the list to have finished on the winning side. The versatile Heitinga, who could play across defence or in midfield, had joined Everton from Atletico Madrid for £6.2million the previous year.
Already an experienced Dutch international who had played in two European Championship finals tournaments and the 2006 World Cup, where he turned out as a right-back for the 1-0 win over Serbia and Montenegro in Leipzig and the 2-1 victory over the Ivory Coast in Stuttgart in the group stage before coming off the bench to operate as a holding midfielder for their 1-0 second round exit to Portugal in Nuremberg, Heitinga won his 50th cap in his first season at Goodison Park in a pre-World Cup friendly against Paraguay in November.
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Playing as a centre-back for Bert van Marwijk’s side, Heitinga was an ever-present throughout the competition in South Africa. Starting with a 2-0 victory over Denmark in Johannesburg, there was a 1-0 win against Japan in Durban and then a 2-1 success over Cameroon in Cape Town during the group stage.
Back in Durban, Slovakia were defeated 2-1 in the second round, then Brazil 2-1 in the quarter-finals in Port Elizabeth before a 3-2 triumph against Uruguay in the semi-finals in Cape Town again. Having won the European Championships two years later – they would also go on to retain their crown in 2012 – Spain, at the height of their ‘tiki-taka’ dominance, were favourites for the trophy but found Dutch resistance to be particularly stubborn.
With 84,490 watching on at Johannesburg’s Soccer City – including a wheelchair-bound Nelson Mandela a week before his 92nd birthday after the former South African president had missed the opening ceremony following the death of his great-granddaughter in a road accident – plus an estimated global television audience of some 900million, the game was locked into a stalemate for a long time.
With Englishman Howard Webb as referee, there were five yellow cards in the first half alone (to Netherlands’ Robin van Persie, Mark van Bommel and Nigel de Jong plus Carles Puyol and Sergio Ramos of Spain), something which BBC Sport’s Paul Fletcher declared: “disturbed the rhythm of the match.” Heitinga didn’t go into the book until a dozen minutes after the restart – by which time his captain Giovanni van Bronkhorst had also been cautioned – but it would prove to be a costly move.
The Everton man got his yellow for a foul on David Villa and almost an hour later in extra time, he transgressed again by bringing down Andres Iniesta as his opponent attempted to run into the penalty area. Howard gave Heitinga a second booking on 109 minutes and reduced to 10 men, the Dutch defence was finally breached just four minutes before there would have been a penalty shootout as Iniesta fired past future Blues goalkeeper Maarten Stekelenburg for the only goal of the game.
Reflecting on the incident a dozen years on, Heitinga last month told Ladbrokes that he still felt the decision was unfair and said: “I was full of emotion in that moment – and walking off that pitch, it just felt like such a long walk.
“I felt lonely. In my eyes, it was an unfair decision; it was very smart from Andres Iniesta for my second booking.
“After the match, I was still upset. I look back now and I'm glad our manager [Bert van Marwijk] grabbed hold of me, because I wanted to attack Howard Webb. In my eyes, it was an unfair decision he made."
The decision to send him off isn't the only decision Heitinga has criticised. He added: “There's a key moment in extra-time and it comes just before Spain score the winning goal. Wesley Sneijder takes a free-kick which deflects off the wall and out for what should have been a corner.
“The officials decided it was a goal kick, and Spain scored in that move. At least if that would have been rightly awarded, we could have killed another 45 seconds or so; and what we can say for sure is that Spain wouldn't have scored the goal.”
Heitinga, 39, now coach of Jong Ajax, the reserve team of the club where he started his career, who compete in the Dutch second tier, has subsequently discussed the decision with former policeman Webb. He said: “I’ve spoken with Howard Webb, who refereed that final in 2010, on a number of occasions.
“I talked with him a couple of months after that night, and he told me it was so difficult for him. Also, from our side, we were not ourselves; we were nervous.
“It was difficult for everyone, but especially Howard and the linesmen; nowadays it’s much easier with VAR. You still feel the pain. It never really goes away.”
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