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Eredivisie Ends…for now….

May 10th, 2009 | By: Jan | 8 Comments »

Very confusing… The Eredivisie is done. Ended. Stopped. Last games played. But then, on Thursday, the Play Offs commence… Probably for the last time.

Anyway, AZ is the champ. We knew that. FC Twente is second and will play for CL football (congrats to all of the mthere…especially Steve McClaren who’s tipped as the new Ajax coach… I’m sure Finn will be delighted!). Feyenoord lost at home to relegation candidate Roda JC 2-3 (Feyenoord down two players).
But NEC couldn’t win either, so now Feyenoord, NAC, FC Utrecht and Grongine will battle for the last Europa League ticket. Ajax, PSV and Heerenveen have their EL ticket already.

In the lower regions, Roda JC does not get relegated directly due to their Feyenoord victory. FC Volendam is now out (again…) and De Graafschap and Roda play playoffs for a spot in the Eredivisie against MVV, Telstar, RKC, Excelsior, Cambuur, Zwolle, FC Dordrecht and Top Oss.

AZ striker El Hamdaoui win the topscorer’s trophee (?), with Luis Suarez, Pranjic, Berg and N Kufo trailing behind.

In Holland, lots of fans, experts and pundits think Scheringa should offer Van Gaal (and Bayern) a free ride, by allowing Louis to move to Munich instead of wanting a pay off. Scheringa: “The only thing I’ll give for free when Bayern drops in to discuss Louis is a cup of coffee….” Hahahaha…

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Comments

By Michel-Olivier | May 10th, 2009 at 9:47 pm

highs:
az won the league
braafheid
berg
v.d.wiel
steve mcclaren
elia

disappointment/lows:
psv
ajax
marco
feyenoord(except wijnaldum, biseswar, and fer.)

next season:
ruud transfer to psv
ricky or berg to ajax
mcclaren sack
ajax champion
sparta relegated

Posted from United States

By stavrogin | May 11th, 2009 at 12:02 am

hi jan,
i have a question for readers of this blog(not related to this post at all)..recently i read somewhere on soccernet that cruyff , during his time as coach of barca used 5 defenders when they played in bernabau. did he actually use defensive line of 5 players or used a holding midfielder(in 4-3-3)…it would be very surprising if he used 5 defenders, cos he absolutely always advocates 4-3-3 or 3-4-3 in all his interviews i have read or heard so far. really crazy question to ask cos its not really related to anything but i need to be sure cos my mates r now telling me how cruyff is a hypocrite who used defensive formations when in charge. so if anyone here knows anything bout this,it would be much appreciated..
thanks

Posted from United States

By Jan | May 11th, 2009 at 12:22 am

Hi Stavrogin, any question on football with some connection to Brilliant Orange is welcomed in this space .

I don’t know the answer to your question, to put it bluntly.

What I do know, is that even with 5 defenders – or 7 defenders – in his team, JC would attack. He famously took a striker off when trailing 1-0 one day to bring a midfielder on. When his players (Marco van Basten) criticized him for it, he said: you can only win when you have the ball. We need to control the game, that’s why I brought another midfielder. JC won that game after the substitution.

So, it’s not about systems or the number of defenders, but it’s about what your intentions are. And JC’s have never been defensive.

Bear in mind too that JC always used a number of attacking players in his back line. Remember Rijkaard, Koeman, Guardiola and others? They all started their careers in midfield or even higher up the park.

By Tiju | May 11th, 2009 at 1:49 am

@stavrogin
I am baby in this blog but one thing i can say as like jan said because of his unique footballing brain and intelligence he would do that no dought.that is Great JC.thats why i want him to coach orange for this upcoming WC2010.i belive with this current crop of talents he will make it.i am damen sure about that.

Posted from India

By stavrogin | May 11th, 2009 at 3:18 am

hey thanks guys…i even wrote to the guy(eduardo alvarez) who wrote that article to ask him for more details(statements like even JC played with 5 defenders r pretty deceptive) but havent got any reply from him..more details on the working of the dream team will be pretty interesting..

Posted from United States

By Jan | May 11th, 2009 at 3:21 am

Could you copy a link to the actual article in the post? I couldn’t find it on Soccer.net.

By Gerard | May 11th, 2009 at 4:01 pm

@stavrogin
I don’t contribute too often to this blog but if I recall correctly Cruyff used something like a very flexible 2-3-2-3 formation with Barcelona so I suppose in certain situations he would be playing with 5 defenders. ie. two centrebacks, two attacking fullbacks and one “pivot” (I think Guardiola) just ahead of the centrebacks. Then when the the team went on the attack, the fullbacks would overlap and Guardiola would move up into a playmaker role. That was a great team to watch.

Posted from Canada

By Igor | May 11th, 2009 at 6:58 pm

Jan (and others), here’s the link to the article in question. I personally don’t feel that the writer is saying that Cruijff’s tactics were defensive, on the contrary he’s saying that even the most attacking minded of coaches (e.g. Cruijff) still had to be weary of Real’s firepower when visiting the Bernebeau.

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/columns/story?id=643278&sec=europe&root=europe&cc=5901

Posted from Canada

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