Champions Beaten at Home: Women’s Hoofdklasse, Round 4 Results
The champions lost at home, and the team that beat them still hasn’t dropped a point. Sunday’s Round 4 in the Women’s Hoofdklasse belonged to Den Bosch, again.
Amsterdam 0-2 Den Bosch: five from five
Amsterdam are the defending champions. Den Bosch went to the Wagener, won 2-0, and walked off with a perfect record: five played, five won.
This is becoming a pattern, not a run. Den Bosch had already beaten Bloemendaal 3-0 and Pinoké 7-1 at home and won at HDM and HGC without conceding much of anything, and Frédérique Matla was the league’s top scorer with nine goals before this round even started. Beating the champions on their own pitch, with a clean sheet, is the loudest result of their season so far. Amsterdam will still be there at the end, they always are. But right now the league runs through Den Bosch.
Victoria 0-5 Pinoké: a tough start gets tougher
Pinoké did the other big damage of the day, winning 5-0 at promoted Victoria. Pinoké needed a day like this. Their season had been a mix of the sublime and the sloppy, a 5-5 draw at Bloemendaal one week and a home defeat the next, and five unanswered goals away from home is the version of them their rivals fear.
Victoria’s introduction to the top flight keeps hurting. They’ve already lost 8-0 at Kampong this season, and heavy home defeats like this one are how a long winter starts.
The rest: SCHC keep pace, Rotterdam surprise Kampong
SCHC beat Hurley 2-1 in Bilthoven to keep themselves in the chasing pack behind Den Bosch. SCHC rarely do drama in the early rounds, they just stack wins, and this was another one.
Rotterdam beat Kampong 2-0 at home, a result that says plenty about both sides. Rotterdam have been up and down all season, but this was a proper scalp. Kampong, who won at Amsterdam’s neighbours and scored eight at Victoria earlier in the season, couldn’t score at all on Sunday.
Bloemendaal edged HDM 1-0 at ‘t Kopje, and Oranje-Rood beat HGC 2-1 in Eindhoven in the day’s other game.
Round 4 scores: Amsterdam 0-2 Den Bosch; Victoria 0-5 Pinoké; SCHC 2-1 Hurley; Rotterdam 2-0 Kampong; Bloemendaal 1-0 HDM; Oranje-Rood 2-1 HGC.
