Arne Slot needs a job and, in the Netherlands, one role is beginning to stand out

Get free access to the most comprehensive World Cup coverage in The Athletic app.A World Cup is coming for the Netherlands and so is a crossroads. Three and a half years with Ronald Koeman at the helm have brought more good days than bad but not an extension to a contract that will expire at the end of this looming tournament.Both parties — Koeman and the KNVB — have shelved talk of what comes next but a parting has begun to feel an increasingly plausible outcome once all are finished up at the World Cup.A nation has its doubts that an unimaginative Koeman warrants longer and a 1-0 loss at home to Algeria on Tuesday night, the warm-up farewell before departing for the U.S. this afternoon, will have done little to swing the mood.The Netherlands will soon be planning moves for their next head coach if time spent across the Atlantic is short and, all of a sudden, there is one candidate standing taller than others.Arne Slot’s exit from Liverpool last week has set minds running in his homeland. A figure considered to be the Netherlands’ most astute coach is on the market and wondering what comes next. In time, there will surely be abundant offers for a man who won the Eredivisie title with Feyenoord in 2022-23 and the 2024-25 Premier League in his first season at Anfield. Events of the summer will dictate if the chance to lead his country will be among them.Slot would undeniably be a popular choice among Dutch football fans. They remember the attack-minded sides he built at AZ and Feyenoord and point to the glories of his first season with Liverpool rather than the failings of his second. Speaking to supporters in Slot’s old home town of Rotterdam — an admittedly unscientific survey — it feels like Slot would be somewhere close to the nation’s ideal.Could this summer be Ronald Koeman’s last in charge of the Netherlands?(Maurice van Steen/ANP/AFP via Getty Images)“He’s a wonderful trainer,” Netherlands fan Matthew Krullaards tells The Athletic outside De Kuip. “I’m not a big fan of Feyenoord, I support Ajax. But I would welcome him, no hard feelings.”