An American journalist has written an open apology to the Dutch after suggesting in a column that all the Dutch Olympic speed skating medals had become boring.

Under the headline ‘An open letter from a sports writer who’s very sorry for trivialising your work in Sochi’ Matthew Futterman wrote in the Wall Street Journal that he does have ‘a deep and abiding respect for your fine country.’

Futterman wrote a humorous column last week in which he suggested the Dutch success in long track speed skating was making the sport boring for ‘anyone not wearing orange underwear’.

That comment, he says, led to him being bombarded with hate mail from the Netherlands, such as ‘Hello cry baby…Come to Holland/Netherlands, then I will give you my 50-year-old Dutch fists on your ugly face.’

In his apology, Fullerman assures his readers he loves Amstel beer, Ruud Gullit, Breugel paintings and even confesses to owning an orange jacket.

Read the column