[size=6]Van Marwijk critical of Webb[/size]

Bert van Marwijk was unhappy with referee Howard Webb's performance in the World Cup final, but accepted Spain deserved to beat Holland.

Andres Iniesta's goal four minutes from the end of extra-time was enough to ensure Spain added the world crown to the European title won two years ago.

At that stage, the Oranje were holding out for a penalty shoot-out with 10 men after defender Johnny Heitinga had been sent off for picking up a second yellow card.

A total of 13 different players were booked during the Soccer City showpiece and Van Marwijk suggested English official Webb had been influenced by comments about his performance in Spain's opening game defeat by Switzerland.

The Holland coach said: "I don't think the referee controlled the match well. But let me be clear about this: the best team won the match.

"I'm trying to analyse the match as best as possible. But I read a few things today about how angry Spain were at the refereeing in the first match against Switzerland.

"If you view the performance (of the referee) today, you'd almost think now that that first match had an influence on this game now."
Terrible fouls

Van Marwijk admitted that some fouls had been "terrible", but said both sides were responsible, though challenges by Nigel de Jong and Mark van Bommel were particularly X-rated.

He added: "It's not our style. Let me put it this way, it's not our style to commit horrible fouls. It's not our kind of football.

"It was a World Cup final and people were tense. Look at the rest of the tournament. I think both sides, also the Spaniards, committed terrible fouls.

"I'm on the bench and I haven't seen any replays. I'd have to see the replays. The way I saw it from the bench was very different."

Van Marwijk said the Dutch had done well to reach the final in South Africa, with Arjen Robben having their best chance in normal time.

"No one expected us to be here, in the final," he said. "We even came very close to a penalty shoot-out. We could even have scored through (Arjen) Robben.

"Whether we would have deserved that, I don't know. But it's a final. It's very disappointing. You want to win it, and we might have done. I think we performed really, really well to get this far.

"The team that scored the first goal was going to win that match. Those chances for Robben could have meant victory for us. But, unfortunately, we weren't so lucky."

He also defended Holland's attempt to 'win ugly', saying: "It was still our intention to play beautiful football, but we were facing a very good opponent. Spain are the best footballing country in the past few years, so we needed to have a top day to beat them.

"We did a good job tactically on them. We got into good positions at times. Both sides committed fouls. That may be regrettable for a final. It's not our style, but you play a match to win.

"It's a World Cup final, and there's a lot of emotion out there. You saw that with both teams. I'd loved to have won that match, even with not so beautiful football."
http://www.skysports.com/football/world-cup-2010/story/0,27032,12021_6256420,00.html