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No. 13 Robin van Persie, Manchester United/the Netherlands
Why he's ranked: Dutch coach Louis van Gaal has vowed to hand van Persie huge responsibility on his national team at the World Cup, even before the duo start working together at Manchester United next season. Van Gaal sees this ex-Arsenal forward as a great leader, a mobile attacking option and a scorer of spectacular goals that few others could even dream of. RvP has also stated his desire to make Brazil 2014 the defining moment of his career. Will he get that chance?
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Key stat: Van Persie is the all time leader in goals for the Netherlands national team (41 through March 5).
What the experts say: "He has become more mature, and for a forward like him that translates into wisdom, opportunity, power and a penchant for scoring goals. The Netherlands will rely on the combined efforts of the van Persie, Robben and Sneijder trio on offense, and those three players could be the ones who dictate how far their national team will go in the World Cup." - Jose Antonio Cortes, ESPN Deportes
Other articles:
- Simon Kuper: Dutch hopes dependent on RvP
- ESPN FC Blogs: Netherlands
- #WorldCupRank: Our Top 50 players of the World Cup
- 32 in 32: Brassell on the Netherlands
- Shaka Hislop on Robin van Persie
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