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Ajax misses out AGAIN!!

August 29th, 2007 | By: Jan | 9 Comments »

Financial director Slop calculated that participating in the CL this season would bring Ajax 13 Mio Euros at the least. Although Ajax made some money this season with the transfers of Babel and Sneijder, consistent competition at the highest level is what Ajax wants. Desperately.

But they missed out. Again. Ajax didn’t learn a lot from the first duel or from the two qualification legs last season. Agression and concentration were Ajax’ enemies once more. Ajax did start in a high pace, but shrewd and fierce play from the boys from Prague did the former Sons of Gods in.

A badly cleared corner kick mid first half resulted in a wonderful volly by Vlcek, and the 1-0 was a fact. That didn’t change to much for Ajax, still they’d need to score twice.

The first part of the job was done after 30 minutes of play. A long Heitinga pass reached the Hunter who back-heeled the ball to Luis Suarez. The new Ajax star didn’t have a problem with the opportunity: 1-1.

And what went wrong in the second half? Ajax created at least 5 huge opportunities (Suarez, Huntelaar, Vertonghen, Stam) but the 36 year old goalie from Prague was unbeatable, only for Vlcek to score his second in the last minutes of the game. Game over.

The team was devastated after the match. Ten Cate: “Everybody is buggered. It’s a tough one. And we prepared so well, we started well but that one Sunday shot sort of took us out for a bit. In these games, everyone needs to be at least a 7 and I’m afraid one or two of us didn’t reach that level. And if you create 5 huge chances at this level but you don’t score, then…yeah…it’s over.”

It’s Ten Cate’s second and probably last year in Amsterdam and the ambitious coach will not be able to lead his team in the CL. For the club it’s sad for financial reasons, but for most players (Emanuelson, Huntelaar, Vertonghen, Schilder, Suarez) it means a limited progression and an extra motivation maybe to leave the club.

Another UEFA year for Ajax I’m afraid…

Tags: Henk ten Cate, Huntelaar, Suarez, The Netherlands

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Comments

By Felix | August 29th, 2007 at 11:55 pm

I don’t know why…. but I really doubt Henk Ten Cate’s ability. I don’t understand this season transfer policy…. They bought Ismael Urzaiz, Albert Luque??? I dont’t believe it!
I will choose Maduro to replace Gabri, put the youngsters like Mitchell Donald, Vurnon Anita, Jeffrey Sarpong, John Goosens to Ajax first team. Give them extra experience… It needs more time, but that’s what Ajax do.
Ajax always produces good footballer…

Posted from Indonesia

By netherlandfanboy | August 30th, 2007 at 12:33 am

I don’t like the idea of buying Spanish man, they’re not the right guys for Ajax’s style. Ajax under Ten Cate is inconsistent, sometimes they play well but sometimes very bad. And the worst thing is that they play really bad when they’re playing under pressure

Posted from United States

By goose | August 30th, 2007 at 2:16 am

well, maybe ill be right with my prediction: TenCate will be gone before Christmas!!

tenCate is not a good coach… its been proven twice now

grtz

Posted from Netherlands

By ferenc | August 30th, 2007 at 3:35 am

the solution is simple: ajax shouldn’t sell its best players. so simple thar. whar a stupid club and president who sells its playmaker 3 days before the crucial cl-game without having a decent replacemenr for him (they even sold perez before). if ajax continues this policy the club will be soon a ghostclub. shame on martin geel,ten cate and everyone who wants ro sell,and nothing else has no importance. only the money,and that’s it – this is the philosophy of ajax. i loved this club,it was europe’s greatest ckub with a famous spirit and style… maybe they need a new visionary president like van praag. i don’t know… shame on them.

btw i remember after barca’s last season some fans said that not frank but henk had been the mastermind behind the team successes. they should look at ajax and ten cate’s results. no comment.

Posted from Hungary

By stephen | August 30th, 2007 at 1:18 pm

a little reminiscing about a better, badder Ajax:

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/columns/story?id=458436&root=uefachampionsleague&cc=5901&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab2pos1

Posted from United States

By Igor | August 30th, 2007 at 2:45 pm

Ajax player better yesterday than the score line suggests and created enough scoring chances to win, but if they can’t beat a team like slavia even once over two games, they certainly don’t deserve to go through. While Ten Cate is not the best coach, it’s hard to blame him when he is not the one in charge of transfers…how can you replace a player like Sneijder three days before the CL qualifier? its clear that when they sold sneijder, the ajax management was consiously throwing away their chance of succeeding in the CL and making it past the group stages. I guess they gambled, figured they could beat slavia and cash in on both the CL money and Sneijder. Does anyone know if Sneijder was trying to force ajax to sell him? i know that earlier in the summer he strongly expressed his desire to leave the club until it looked like no one was interested anymore.

Posted from Canada

By goose | August 30th, 2007 at 2:48 pm

thanks stephen, nice story..even for a non ajax person this period was the highlight of our dutch club football history

what a team that was.. Keizer, Suurbier, Hulshof, Cruijff, Rep… it was actually almost Ajax that played the WC74.. without Ajax we wouldnt have had glory in that WC (well, not glory but all out respect)..

good days for dutch club football, dont think Psv will do anything this year..

Psv plays Inter , funny coincedence stephen..like Ajax did in the article!

grzt

btw: seen all of the 74 tapes?

Posted from Netherlands

By stephen | August 30th, 2007 at 5:59 pm

Whether we like Ajax or not, I think we would all agree that it would be great for Dutch football to see a strong dutch team compete for the grand prize year in and year out. Ajax used to represent this. I hope they can get back to that point one day. They seem to be the one recognizable flag-bearer for the Eredivisie. However with the lure of bigger leagues and bigger cash, it’s getting harder and harder to do.

@goose, I haven’t watched them all yet. I’n still stuck at half time in the Brazil game. I plan to finish this weekend.

Posted from United States

By goose | August 31st, 2007 at 10:35 am

here are some tubes:
1. Golden era Ajax:
http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=-ep68cSU-QY

2. Little clip of Piet Keizer
http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=bTUen86MplQ

Posted from Netherlands

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