Dutch Arsenal connection gunning for World Cup glory

The Netherlands stand one step away from their first ever women's World Cup final thanks to a core of players aiming to conquer the world after taking Arsenal back to the top in England.

Vivianne Miedema's thumping headed opener in their 2-0 quarter-final win over Italy on Saturday helped give her side a last four clash with Sweden on Wednesday. It was her third in France after scoring an astonishing 31 goals in 28 games for the Gunners as they won their first Women's Super League in seven years.

Lining up behind her, for both club and country for the past two years, have been attacking midfielder Danielle van de Donk, centre-back Dominique Bloodworth and goalkeeper Sari Van Veenendaal, and Miedema recognised the impact having same players form the spine of both teams.

"Obviously it's really easy, we've been playing together for two years, we play as goalie, centre back, number 10 and me and it's the same at Arsenal so you get to know each other a lot better," Miedema said after beating the Italians.

"I just need to look at Dominique Bloodworth and I know where's she's going to play the ball. It's the same with DVD (Van de Donk), we just have that connection. It helps me a lot and it helps our team a lot, and I'm happy that we've got that."
- 'I know exactly what they're doing' -
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"I think we are all in the core of the team so I think it's important that we're so fluent in working together."