In their quarter-final confrontation on Saturday at the FIFA Women’s World Cup, second half headers from Vivianne Miedema and Stefanie van der Gragt won the Netherlands a 2-0 victory over Italy.
The victory gave the European champions a first-ever place in the World Cup last four.
The Dutch, deserved heat-intensive winners at the Stade du Hainaut, will face the winner of the other quarter-finals between Germany and Sweden on Saturday, later played in Rennes.
In the first half, Italy, which has never exceeded the last eight, had the best of chances.
But after the break, the European champions stepped up their game and both goals came from Sherida Spitse’s quality set-piece deliveries.
The U.S. World Cup defending champions will face England in Tuesday’s opening semi-final in Lyon with Wednesday’s second semi-final.
The left-sided playmaker from the Netherlands, Lieke Martens, was fit to play despite experiencing a foot injury, picked up in the past round’s goal festivities.
With the venue just a two-hour drive from the Dutch border, in the bright sunshine, the 22,600 crowd was mostly covered in Orange.
But despite these boosts, the Netherlands originally struggled to generate openings against a well-marshaled Italian defense by captain Sara Gama.
The Azzurre had the first real chance when Valentina Bergamaschi was discovered in the region by Barbara Bonansea’s flick-on.
But for Dutch goalkeeper Sari van Veenendaal, the lob of the midfielder was too simple.
Bergamaschi had another opportunity when she squashed her shot after a intelligent interchange won her space in the box.
Moments later, Valentina Giacinti pulled her shot wide from a promising place.
Clearly, the Dutch coach Sarina Wiegman took advantage of the break to tackle their issues and after the interval it was a very distinct strategy.
Also helping the Netherlands step up the tempo was the introduction of Lineth Beerensteyn for the out-of-sorts right-winger Shanice van de Sanden.
But it was from a set-piece when the breakthrough arrived in the 70th minute.
Spitse, from wide to left, whipped in a good, high cross and the towering Miedema timed her run and jumped to beat Laura Guiliani perfectly with a slender, gaunt header.
The match was placed beyond the Italians ten minutes later.
Nonetheless, this time from the right, the defender Van Der Gragt had a strong, flat cross with a strong header.
Italy had nothing remaining in the tank and from that time on it was the Dutch cruise control.
The winners will now look forward to their first chance of achieving the final.
