Patrick Kluivert’s Indonesia reign off to rocky start with AFC World Cup qualifying group on knife edge

Five teams, including Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, still in mix for automatic qualification to 2026 finals or play-off spot

Patrick Kluivert's first game as Indonesia coach saw his team lose 5-1 to Australia. AP

Spare a thought in this crunch period of international football for Martin Reijnders and his wife, Angelina Lekatompessy.

They are the proud parents of talented brothers. But it is tense, exhilarating, and exhausting viewing when you have two sons both contesting high-stakes matches in time zones 10 hours apart and both their fortunes swing on a missed penalty.

On Sunday night, the Reijnders parents endured a Uefa Nations League quarter-final that, after 120 minutes of see-saw open play, had remained stubbornly unresolved.

Their eldest, Tijjani, of AC Milan, had scored one of the goals in the Netherland’s series of comebacks in a wild tie against Spain that, after two legs, ended at 5-5 on aggregate.

Alas, Tijjani was off the pitch, watching from tantalising distance when the decisive, penalty shoot-out went Spain’s way.

Three days earlier, in Sydney, Eliano Reijnders, Tijjani’s younger brother, was enduring a similar agony, yards away from a teammate’s penalty jitters.

Eliano plays not for the Netherlands but for Indonesia, Angelina’s country of heritage. His World Cup qualifier against Australia had begun with verve and promise from the visitors, their early enterprise rewarded with an eighth-minute spot-kick in their favour.

Alas, Kevin Diks struck the penalty against the post. Energy visibly drained from the Indonesians; Australia went on to win 5-1.

In the taut mathematics of Asian qualifying Group C for the 2026 World Cup, that’s an emphatic result – and a surprising one given the gathering reputation of Indonesia.

They have been steady climbers up the Fifa rankings in the last two years, a period in which a large number of dual-national players, many of them born in the Netherlands, have committed to representing the Indonesia of their parentage or grandparentage, as Eliano Reijnders has.

They’ve been encouraged to do so by a bullish Indonesian Football Federation, determined the country’s senior squad should start punching nearer its weight, in terms of population, in the world’s favourite sport.

A first appearance at a World Cup finals since 1938 – when Indonesia was still the Dutch East Indies, under colonial rule – is an explicit target. For the world’s fourth most populous nation that’s a target that should be achievable in the next decade.

The difficulty for the 2026 World Cup campaign is that so many big countries, or countries with very big ambitions, have been concentrated into the same tight space – Group C of the third round of Asian qualifying. That's C for cagey. Or for combustible.

It's a mini league that goes into its last phase on a knife edge. One of the two automatic spots in North America next year has been claimed – at express pace – by Japan.

But beneath the impressive Japanese is a five-way dogfight: Australia’s win over Indonesia has left them on 10 points and currently in the cherished runners-up berth, which leads direct to the finals.

But any one of Saudi Arabia – on nine points – or Indonesia, Bahrain or China – locked on six points each – could still leapfrog the Socceroos with three matchdays remaining.

For the eventual third and fourth place finishers, there will be more suspense, in the brutal fourth phase of qualifying starting in late summer.

There is a vast constituency hanging on the outcomes of Tuesday’s potentially decisive jousts: China, the planet’s second most populous nation, are hosting Australia; Saudi Arabia, the most obviously upwardly-mobile power in contemporary sport, are at unbeaten Japan.

Indonesia are at home to a Bahrain who might be forgiven for feeling dwarfed in this company but who have proved competitive so far.

“It’s a hard sprint for that second spot,” said Herve Renard, the Saudi Arabia manager. “We all know every single point could change the look of the whole group,” noted Branko Ivankovic, the China coach. “A very tough group,” agreed Tony Popovic, his Australian counterpart.

So tough, indeed, that every coach has reason to feel vulnerable. Apart from the long-serving Japan manager Hajime Moriyasu, no manager in Group C is able to look back at a body of work stretching all the way to the start of Asia’s 2026 World Cup qualifying odyssey.

Renard was appointed to his second spell with Saudi Arabia after the October 2024 sacking of Roberto Mancini. The previous month Popovic had replaced Graham Arnold, who resigned after the Socceroos had taken just one point from matches against Bahrain and Indonesia.

China, meanwhile, replaced Aleksandar Jankovic with Ivankovic last February, at about the time Bahrain brought in Dragan Talajic for Juan Antonio Pizzi.

As for Indonesia, they made a radical shift at the beginning of this year, bringing to an end Shin Tae-Yong’s five years progressing the national team and appointing the former Netherlands striker Patrick Kluivert as the new man in charge.

Safe to report that there are doubts about the wisdom of that appointment – and that it has been as tough a week for the Kluivert family as it has for the Reijnders clan.

While Indonesia’s new boss was digesting a 5-1 loss on his touchline debut, his son Justin was setting up the first Dutch goal in the epic Nations League tussle with Spain but would be sitting with Tijjani Reijnders among the substituted Dutch players by the time that tie went into its penalty shoot-out.

The senior Kluivert, whose previous senior managerial posts – with the Curacao national team and with Adana Demirspor in Turkey – have been brief partly owes his summons to Jakarta to those strengthening ties between Dutch football and the make-up of the Indonesia squad.

Ten of the starters whom Kluivert lined up in Sydney were born in the Netherlands. The wholesale drafting of foreign-born players has been a hasty upheaval, too.

Kluivert’s initial XI against the Socceroos included only two players with more than dozen Indonesia caps to their name.

These are not ideal for stability, for establishing routines. A when a losing team’s support base draws from 280 million people, the disapproval tends to be heard loud.

It has been a testing few days for Indonesia’s much-criticised new manager. Nor can Kluivert take much comfort that his first home fixture is against the smallest nation in the Group C mix. His short spell managing Curacao came to an end, three and half years ago, shortly after a 4-0 loss in a friendly to Bahrain.

But pressure is evenly spread. Renard dare not rely on Japan, now they are safely through to the finals, easing up against his Green Falcons.

Japan have been both high-scoring and mean at the back in their sweep of the group so far; Saudi Arabia have become notoriously goal-shy, an issue under Mancini and not one convincingly solved by Renard.

Australia, meanwhile, have a habit of being slow off the blocks, as they were against Indonesia, a nervousness disguised by the final scoreline.

“It’s something we understand and want to improve,” said Popovic, stressing the need to quieten China’s home crowd at the 80,000 Hangzhou stadium.