This touches on a much deep problem with Dutch national football. It's ruled by popularity and popularity has nothing to do with performance. Frank de Boer was a good player but he was also known for making a mistake every game. On of those mistakes cost us the 2002 WC and he had quite a role in euro 2000 exit. If you think the British press is bad, the Dutch football press always demands a manager they get along with, and often get it, and then want a say in who plays. They start demanding from that manager that he starts with the players they like for whatever reason, usually it's got nothing to do with performances or even level.
The Dutch FA usually gives in, there was a fresh president in 2012 and didn't. He appointed Van Gaal, the man that did the managerial performance of the century with Ajax from 90-95, made AZ champions which is something like Leicester winning the PL, transformed Bayern Munich and almost won the CL, objectively there could not be much discussion about it. But the amount of **** they got over them in the 2 years leading up to the Spain game was tremendous, despite the qualis going smooth.
But that was the exception. The Dutch FA usually appoints the manager that is the cowardly compromise, the one that the media likes. And they liked De Boer, they supported his appointment and presented it as some inevitability. Even until today they claimed he had done well with Ajax. He hadn't, he made Ajax into a European bystander, only just good enough to bore the weak Dutch opposition of that time into small margin defeats, just enough to win the league, leaning on the system learned in the youth academy.
What Dutch football needs is a FA president with a spine who appoints the best manager for the job and then unfolds his umbrella to take the shitstorm. Don't listen to the players, not to the pseudo-vedettes and leaders who don't lead when it matters. Wijnaldum, Van Dijk, they spoke out against Van Gaal to take the place of Koeman while that's exactly the kind of manager a fairly low talented squad like this needed. They're responsible too. Of course his reputation is intimidating, but you're not there to have an easy time, but to win.
This is not the first time players and media together managed to activate the self destruction mechanism. It's only after that and in special circumstances that the FA feels free to hire the best man for the job.