The best Dutch players of all time

Not many nations have influenced football as much as the Dutch.

The emergence of Total Football in the 1970s transformed the game as we know it, gifting players the freedom to move effortlessly into different roles across the pitch and even laying the foundations for the tiki-taka style that has dominated much of the 21st century. Much of the beautiful attacking football fans see today can be traced back to Holland.

To employ such a fluid style you need some darn talented players and the Netherlands have produced them in abundance. The 1980s and 1990s were particularly fruitful for gifted Dutch footballers, but there are some modern icons that have carried the torch.

Here are the 25 best Dutch players of all time.

Clinical Dutch strikers have been all too regular over the years, but not many can match Faas Wilkes’ remarkable goalscoring record. He netted 35 times in just 38 matches for the Oranje, representing his country for a grand total of 15 years.

The former Inter and Valencia forward played from the middle of the 1940s to the early 1960s, which was not the Netherlands’ most fruitful era. Still, Wilkes was an exceptional talent in an average team.

An 11-year international career with Holland never quite hit the heights it could have, with the former Ajax, Arsenal and Barcelona star representing Holland at four major tournaments.

While he was unable to fire the Dutch to glory on the big stage, Marc Overmars was always a dynamic presence in a formidable forward line, bagging 17 times in 86 international outings,

While not quite able to match Wilkes’ insane goals to game average, Patrick Kluivert was similarly ruthless in the final third. A fleet-footed forward with a great turn of pace, the striker managed 40 goals in 79 appearances for the Oranje.

He was the Netherlands’ all-time top goalscorer until 2015 and peaked at Euro 2000 on home soil. Kluivert claimed the Golden Boot at the championships with five strikes and was always a handful for…