The players of the Dutch national squad are being allowed to twitter away to their hearts’ content during the upcoming World Cup in South Africa. National coach Bert van Marwijk, an ardent twitterer himself, has no objections to his players posting snatches of their innermost feelings on social network sites such as Twitter or Facebook.

”It’s not something we want to ban,” says Dutch Football Association press chief Kees Jansma on the national football website www.onsoranje.nl. “The only danger is that you risk unintentionally giving information on your whereabouts to people who are up to no good. That can compromise the team’s safety. So we’ve made it perfectly clear that they shouldn’t post messages like ‘we’re on our way to restaurant A, B or C’. But apart from that there are no restrictions, except for those imposed by FIFA at the stadiums,” explains Mr Jansma, who is no stranger to Twitter himself.

Followers
The best-known twitterer in the Dutch team is Ryan Babel. Over 24,000 people follow the Liverpool striker via @RyanBabel. But Babel has quite a bit of company. There are a host of microbloggers in and around the Dutch team ready to provide the inside scoop on the World Cup:
@VanMarwijk_NL10
@keesjansma
@EljeroElia4Real
@sboschker
@Ooijer_NL10
@RafaVdVaart
@Ibi_Affelay
@robinVanPersie7 - already very active, in English
@GvanderWiel – already very active

Lil Wayne
If anyone has learned that you should think twice before you share your tweets with the rest of the world, surely it’s Gregory van der Wiel? The Ajax defender bowed out of a Dutch away match against Australia, claiming to be suffering from concussion. But he went on to raise plenty of eyebrows when he twittered about having a great night out at a concert by rapper Lil Wayne when he was supposed to be recovering. The subsequent dressing down he received from the national coach may well have been enough to teach him the value of discretion.

Ban
A number of Bert van Marwijk’s fellow trainers think very differently about the pros and cons of twittering footballers. Vicente del Bosque of Spain and Fabio Capello of England are going to great lengths to make sure that nothing distracts their players from the ultimate objective of their stay in South Africa: bringing home the World Cup. They are not about to take the risk of information leaking out when they want it kept firmly behind closed doors. Del Bosque and Capello both agree: Twitter and Facebook are all well and good, but after – not during – the World Cup.

Brazil
The policy in the Brazilian camp is a good deal more flexible, as you might expect from the nation that gave the world samba football. The players selected by national coach Dunga are twittering away like mad. Kaká (@RealKaka) leads the way, with around 650,000. Midfielders Felipe Melo and Gilberto Silva, and striker Luís Fabuloso are also keen to share their tweets with the world: @_FelipeMelo_, @GilbertoSilva15, @luis_fabuloso.