HOLLAND coach Bert van Marwijk is predicting a battle royal against the “fighters” of Uruguay in tomorrow’s semi-final but believes his players have added some steel to their renowned brand of attractive football.

The Dutch are the clear favourites to make it to Sunday’s final, especially with Robin van Persie declared fit and the South Americans’ striker Luis Suarez suspended following his now infamous handball.

Like all his predecessors since Rinus Michels, Van Marwijk has had to endure comparisons with the man who invented ‘total football’ for the Dutch, but he believes he has now added to the flair that they have become famous for.

He said: “When I took over this job, my first goal was to teach the team to defend better.

“Because we haven’t scored that many goals so far in this World Cup, people see it differently as they only associate attractive football with lots of goals. But we still play attractive football.

“Uruguay are a team of fighters. They battle and survive. That is why they have reached the semi-finals. We must certainly not underestimate them, otherwise things will go wrong for us.”

Uruguay will also be without Jorge Fucile, one of the outstanding defenders of the tournament, but Van Marwijk is preaching a message of caution based on bitter memories of past opportunities that brilliant Dutch teams let slip.

He added: “We have been down this road before in the past with other Dutch teams and the Dutch people have been let down time and again. We have to take the duel with Uruguay very seriously because, mentally, it is difficult to get yourselves back into the mix after a victory against Brazil.

“It has now been two years that I have been trying to get the players to understand that in order to be world champions, they must shine regularly without ever letting up.

“We haven’t succeeded in our mission yet. The target, to be crowned champions, is not yet achieved.”

Arsenal striker Van Persie, who has led the line for Holland without much reward in terms of goals, has been declared fit for the Cape Town match after injuring his left elbow against Brazil in Friday’s quarter-final showdown.

The history between the two nations was a major topic of discussion in the run-up to the game, and Liverpool striker Dirk Kuyt later admitted that provided even greater motivation.

However, he also insisted the Holland arrived in South Africa firmly believing they could go one better than their predecessors did in both 1974 and 1978, when they were beaten in the final, first by West Germany and then by Argentina.

Kuyt, whose perfect back-header from a corner set up teammate Wesley Sneijder’s winning goal, said: “We already had that feeling before the tournament, that on our day, we can beat every country in the world.

“But at the end of the day, we have to show it and we showed it on Friday.

“We deserved to win. We won 2-1, but the chances we had, it could have been 3-1 or 4-1.

“It was revenge for 1998 and I am glad that we have turned it around.

“But at the end of the day, the most important thing for us was to win and to show the world we can compete with the best teams in the world. It’s unbelievable. I really enjoyed it, playing at the highest level in the quarter-final.

“But now we are focussed on the next game. I don’t think we realise how big it is at this stage because we have to be focused and we have to try to go all the way.”

Added Kuyt: “We still have to be careful and take it step by step, but we are very happy and very satisfied.”