Europa Cup I winner PSV looks back on the final: “That’s the only thing I thought”

The season 1987/1988 is without a doubt the most successful season in the club’s history to date. Under the leadership of Guus Hiddink, PSV in fact won the national double with a commanding lead, and the team also won the Europa Cup I on 25 May 1988 by defeating the Portuguese Benfica in the final on penalties, 6-5.

In that season, Wim Kieft returned to the Netherlands to play football for PSV. The former striker had played in Italy for a number of years and decided to return to the Netherlands in 1987.

Where the born Amsterdammer took the penalties in Italy, that was not the case at PSV, the former international still remembers. ''In Italy I took the penalty kicks, but when I came to PSV, we had Ronald Koeman'', the former PSV player tells in the podcast KieftJansenEgmondGijp.

When the PSV - Benfica final in Stuttgart ended in the taking of penalty kicks, in the end it was still up to Kieft to fire the ball into the goal from the penalty spot. ''I took the second or the third, I think. Where I shot it? To the right of the goalkeeper,'' the former striker still remembers.

Afterwards, writer Michel van Egmond steps in. ''What do you remember about that penalty?'', to which Kieft replies: ''I thought: 'As long as I don't miss him'. That's the only thing I thought.''

Then Van Egmond continues. ''That isn't a nice thought, actually'', says the writer. ''No, but the pressure is, of course, very high'', Kieft then replies.

In the end, PSV managed to win the penalty shootout when Hans van Breukelen saved the sixth penalty taken by right-back António Veloso. ''No one missed, by the way, because we were fifteen penalties in already and the keepers still hadn’t saved a single one. It’s because that right-back from Benfica hit it so badly that Hans van Breukelen had to save it. No, you just choose a corner. And then as hard as possible, so that the keeper can’t get to it. It’s enormous pressure. You can certainly have that never-ending debate, but you can’t train it,'' concludes the current analyst.