Het Gouden Binnentrio

During the darkest period of Dutch football, between the end of World War II and the introduction of (semi)professional football in the second half of the fifties, three inside forwards of international class became known as the "Gouden Binnentrio", the "golden inside trio", although they only played 10 matches for the national team together, half of these against either Belgium (3 draws) or Luxembourg (2 easy wins, but conceding 4 goals which says something about the defensive weakness of the side). While "us Abe" Lenstra never went abroad and remained an amateur with his club Heerenveen (apart from a short time at Sportclub Enschede at the end of his career, when professional football had finally been introduced in the Netherlands), Faas Wilkes (in Italy and Spain) and Kees Rĳvers (in France) pursued very successful careers abroad, where they were paid for their football prowess.

Below we list all matches of the Dutch national team in which the three played together – 8 of them directly after the war, culminating in the participation of the national team in the 1948 Olympics, in which they were unlucky to lose 3-4 after extra time against hosts Great Britain in the round of 16. In all those ten matches, at least one of the three found the net.
The trio was broken up when Faas Wilkes left for Internazionale, where he started in 1949/50, scoring 17 goals in 34 matches in his first season abroad (in his second season, he improved on that ratio, scoring 23 goals in 38 matches). Only when he and Rĳvers (who had a highly successful stint at AS Saint-Etienne, a club that later held a curse on the PSV side Rĳvers trained in the seventies) returned to the Netherlands, the trio was briefly reunited for the national side in the eventually unsuccessful qualifying campaign for the 1958 World Cup in Sweden (the decisive loss having been suffered away to Austria in a scandalous match in which only Wilkes played, Oranje losing 2-3 after having led by 2 goals and eventually succumbing to a highly contentious penalty given by the German referee).

Cap  Goals	Date	Venue   	Opponent       Score	Competition
     L R W  T
 1     1 4  5 10- 3-46  Luxembourg      Luxembourg      6-2
 2   1 2 2 10 21- 9-47  Amsterdam       Switzerland     6-2
 3   1     11 14- 3-48  Antwerpen       Belgium         1-1
 4   1     12 18- 4-48  Rotterdam       Belgium         2-2
 5       1 13  9- 6-48  Amsterdam       Sweden          1-0 [!]
 6       2 15 26- 7-48  Portsmouth      Ireland         3-1     Olympic Games
 7       1 16 31- 7-48  London          Great Britain   3-4 aet Olympic Games
 8   1   1 18 13- 3-49  Amsterdam       Belgium         3-3
 9   2 1 1 22 11- 9-57  Rotterdam       Luxembourg      5-2     World Cup Qualifier
10   1     23 25- 9-57  Amsterdam       Austria         1-1     World Cup Qualifier

[!] this match also featured the famous Gre-No-Li striking trio for Sweden

Total Record
 
    GP    GW   GD   GL   GF  GA     Pts  Percentage
    10     5    4    1   31- 18      14      70.00
 
23 Goals (Wilkes 12, Lenstra 7, Rĳvers 4) in 10 Matches (2.30 per match)
 

Types of Matches and Goals

                      Goals Matches Goals by Player
Friendlies        	15    6     (Wilkes  8, Lenstra 4, Rĳvers 3)
  vs Belgium               4    3     (Wilkes  1, Lenstra 3, Rĳvers -)
World Cup Qualifier	 5    2     (Wilkes  1, Lenstra 3, Rĳvers 1)
Olympic Games            3    2     (Wilkes  3, Lenstra -, Rĳvers -)

Total                	23   10     (Wilkes 12, Lenstra 7, Rĳvers 4)

About this document

Prepared and maintained by Karel Stokkermans for the Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation

Author: Karel Stokkermans (karel.rsssf@gmail.com)
Last updated: 18 Apr 2024