Ajax Coaches

[Sir Alex Ferguson]

No No I just feel you are not equiped in Europe or the Dutch league playing your current formation.

Even 4-4-2 would be better than 4-3-3.

You also look very unbalanced with a pantamine horse on one wing and a small person who is fired out of cannons on the other.

Things must change and quickly.

I also feel it is a little arrogant to suggest that on current form Ajax will beat Willem.

[Kowalczyk]

Chaps, perhaps it is time to drop some so called high profile players and blood more youngsters?

We don't have any high profile players... Not even 'so-called' high profile players...

As for the discussion about formations (4-3-3, 4-4-2, 3-5-2, whatever)... as I said to my good mate Pizza 5 a few times: I don't think the current problems have got anything to do with formations at all. The true reason for the nightmare we're having goes much deeper than that. This team, at this moment, would play terrible in any formation (in fact: that point has been proved on many occasions this season).

Maybe I'll write a longer posting on this subject tomorrow... Right now I'm too tired for that.

K.

[SE6Ajacied]

If the players aren't playing then the formation matters not a jot....there's a saying about you can't win a game with 11 Alan Shearer's (or whoever). To my mind that's pretty interchangeable to the fact that if the players are lacking form and confidence then it takes more than a change around of formation to get things going. That takes time on the training ground and dare I say it a bit of luck on the pitch (whih we seem to have lacked a bit of late).

(And yes I saw the PSV game so not putting all our troubles down to luck...far from it.

[aveslacker]

You also look very unbalanced with a pantamine horse on one wing and a small person who is fired out of cannons on the other.

I also feel it is a little arrogant to suggest that on current form Ajax will beat Willem.

Good one. :xyxthumbs: :yes:

[pizza 5]

I know you guys think I keep banging on about it,but 3-5-2 would definatly suit our existing players better than the current 4-3-3.Im not saying we would win the champions league but Im sure we could scrape a draw at Heerenveen.

[Sir Alex Ferguson]

SE6,

Strange combination Blackpool and Ajax.

Is it that they are both crap at present or is it just that you are addicted to the colour orange?

I think Pizza 5 makes a very solid point about formation afterall, success does need a little strategy and organisation and good sides play a flexible system.

Not being too contoversial but 4-3-3 is now a lttle predictable dont you think? Opposition teams may just have twigged the formation Ajax are going to play?

[SE6Ajacied]

Sir Alex,

Mighty Blackpool :headbang: are by far the best team out there - they're actually one of the strogest teams in the league this year (though not quite as strong as Stockport who are holding everyone else up).

It's not an oranje thing. That would make me an RBC or Volendam fan and besides, Blackpool play in tangerine didn't you know.

pah! :redcard:

[Number9]

Let's bring in a three man rotation at the head coaching position...

1. Co
2. Cow-man
3. Blind

That way we can fire a manager after every game and have two left for rumors and speculation. I've said it again and again... Koeman was NOT the problem. Now we see that this is true. Losses to Willem II and AZ will further confirm this.

My prediction: Ajax 6th in Eredivisie in 2005

Just as Koeman benefited from all the hard work done by Co, now Blind reaps the rewards of the platform laid by Koeman. You can't expect him to turn around the team in a week. I think Ajax will continue to have a shit April, but once May rolls round, there's a few easy games to finish the season, and begin the rebuilding for next year.

EDIT: actually the last week of April is when the easy games begin, RBC and De Graafschap.

Oh give it a rest. If Co was such an awesome manager he would still be at Ajax. As it was, he was run out of the back door in a fashion not unlike the scenario that Koeman left. (Except Koeman walked out the front door). My point is that the problems at Ajax are far more than the manager... as we are seeing with the latest front office man to jump ship. The list is endless and I won't rehash it here.

On another note... okay... we beat Willem f-ing II. Great now we can finish 5th if were lucky. As for assuming wins vs de Graaf and RBC... don't be surprised when one of those matches ends in a draw.

[Number9]

Do the 3rd,4th and 5th clubs plus cup winners still qualify for UEFA Cup?

Yes.

So, I admit it will be really hard to not qualify for the UEFA Cup, but we're working on it.

K.

My point exactly...

Yeah we'll probably finish in a uefa spot... but we certainly don't deserve it.

[Frans]

Oh give it a rest. If Co was such an awesome manager he would still be at Ajax. As it was, he was run out of the back door in a fashion not unlike the scenario that Koeman left. (Except Koeman walked out the front door). My point is that the problems at Ajax are far more than the manager... as we are seeing with the latest front office man to jump ship. The list is endless and I won't rehash it here.

On another note... okay... we beat Willem f-ing II. Great now we can finish 5th if were lucky. As for assuming wins vs de Graaf and RBC... don't be surprised when one of those matches ends in a draw.

Yeah, Co must be not be that good. Look at his track record. Abysmal. And those also-rans he's coaching this year - who'd have thought any team could be so ... average.

But semantics aside, I would put the idea forward (and I'm not the first to do so) that Koeman was one of the main causes of Ajax's stale on-field performances. I'd further say that this could be proved if Ajax is again performing some sort of semblance of football by the end of the season, or at least at the beginning of next season.

To say Ajax has other problems could very well be true. However, it is the coach who is responsible for the on-field performance. Board-room issues should have no effect during a game


Anyway, Here's my prediction for the end of the season:

Ajax will noticeably improve their play under their new coach. They'll book a result against either AZ or Feyenoord, Thrash the living bejeezus out of DeG and RBC, and grab enough points from the remaining games to finish 3rd.

Yeah we'll probably finish in a uefa spot... but we certainly don't deserve it.

Name 6 dutch sides more deserving of european football. Otherwise, that statement is bullshit.

[Kowalczyk]

Yeah we'll probably finish in a uefa spot... but we certainly don't deserve it.

Name 6 dutch sides more deserving of european football. Otherwise, that statement is bullshit.

That's right, Frans.

I agree that we don't deserve a Champions League slot: PSV and AZ have been way better than us throughout the season and (even though their team is worse than ours) even F-Word have offered their fans more enjoyable moments than Ajax.

But we don't deserve a UEFA Cup slot...? That's a bit of an exaggeration...

PSV and AZ in the Champions League. Feyenoord, Heerenveen, Vitesse and Twente in the UEFA Cup...? I guess we 'deserve' one of those slots, don't we? (nothing to be proud of, but still)

K.

[SPL]

We may be playing crap but even we cannot fail to finish 4th. We are 12 points clear of 5th place with only a maximum 21 points to play for.UEFA cup next season is certain. A win on Sunday would of course put us only a point behind AZ( we have played a game more of course) I do not expect us on current form to overtake AZ but football is a strange game.

I will watch the Heerenveen game this afternoon ,it was on Channel 5 last night. Although we lost it can never be as bad as watching the PSV game which was quite frankly embarrising. Channel 5 have the AZ game on next week and probably the F-word the week after so at least we in the UK will have the chance to watch some action.

[Number9]

Yeah, Co must be not be that good. Look at his track record. Abysmal. And those also-rans he's coaching this year - who'd have thought any team could be so ... average.

But semantics aside, I would put the idea forward (and I'm not the first to do so) that Koeman was one of the main causes of Ajax's stale on-field performances. I'd further say that this could be proved if Ajax is again performing some sort of semblance of football by the end of the season, or at least at the beginning of next season.

To say Ajax has other problems could very well be true. However, it is the coach who is responsible for the on-field performance. Board-room issues should have no effect during a game


Name 6 dutch sides more deserving of european football. Otherwise, that statement is bullshit.

Good points, but your logic actually proves my point. When Co was sacked after a bad month... (November 2001) Ajax had just had a string of three bad games and the supporters were demanding he be fired. (Sound familiar?) Co gets canned and Ajax win the Eredivisie.

So you say that if Ajax does well that will "prove" that Koeman was the problem? By that reasoning, Co was the problem in 2001. We both know that's not true. The fact is Ajax fans demand a winner... and we should demand a winner. But to say it's the coaches sole fault is bullshit.

You are correct that it is the coach who is responsible for on field performance. I agree...in our professions we are held to a standard. When your number one weapon is sold a couple of days before the season starts that "board room issue" will affect the game. There is no way around it. Koeman was basically asked to run (and win) the Indy 500 in a f-ing Yugo.

As for European football, I can't name 6 dutch teams even remotely deserving of Euro football. We have three... PSV, AZ and F-word. And it pains my red and white heart to say that.

[Kowalczyk]

Weeks ago it was announced that Alfons Groenendijk, who briefly played for Ajax around 1991-1993, was signed as a youth coach. This was finally confirmed on Ajax.nl today. He will be John van den Brom's assistant at Young Ajax and he will also coach the A2 youth team.

We will, by the way, not run this as news on Ajax USA (not related to Ajax-1).

K.

[Kowalczyk]

Okay, the moment has arrived... I am now seriously starting to doubt Danny Blind's qualities as a coach, and I wasn't the only one at the ArenA yesterday.

What I liked about Blind when he first arrived on the scene was the fact that he's an 'Ajax idealist', just like - for example - Louis van Gaal: unlike Ronald Koeman (who is a cynical 'survivor') he wants Ajax to play 'Ajax football' and he asked everyone for their patience, because he had some sort of a bigger plan.

At first, I saw what he was doing. The results were disappointing, but in the latter months of last season (AZ at home, Feyenoord away) and several games in the current season (particularly Sparta Prague away) I really saw what Blind's plan was, what he was going for and what he wanted for this Ajax team.

But then he started to do things that I didn't understand...

1. In spite of the fact that he wants Ajax to play 'real' Ajax football in a 4-3-3 formation, he sold Daniel de Ridder and preferred Pienaar (???) as a right winger.

2. The Escudé affair. This dude was one of Ajax's best last season and - very important - the only Ajacied who is enough of a pro to seriously work on his shortcomings. His sprinting improved and he worked in the gym to get physically stronger. He started scoring, his passing improved, he was selected for France and he became Ajax's captain. Good for him and he really deserved it. He started the season as the captain of Ajax-1, but was then dropped after one (1) poor game (against Feyenoord). I genuinely don't understand that, especially given the fact that Blind - for some mysterious reason that is absolutely beyond me - seems to rate John Heitinga, who was once again a big f*cking nightmare defensively and as a passer.

3. The Lindenbergh/Galásek mystery. Everyone agreed that Ajax's number one problem was a complete lack of balance, experience and power in midfield. But then Blind decided to play Lindenbergh and Galásek together (Sparta Prague away was the best example). And it worked! There seemed to be a whole new order in midfield and Ajax played their best 150 minutes of football with these two in midfield. But then Lindenbergh was red carded and after his suspension... (guess what) he never returned. I do not get that. At all.

4. The fact that he keeps f*cking shifting his team around... I liked Blind because it seemed that he was not going to do that, but he is doing at least as many weird things as Koeman now. Rosales as a left winger (PSV away), eight different forward lines in eight different league games, Pienaar and Babel as wingers, the 'goalkeeper carroussel' (Vonk/Stekelenburg) and (the latest) taking Juanfran off against NEC (who was having a reasonable game) and then moving Grygera to the left (WTF??). The Ajax formation looks like a f*cking Rubik's Kube at the moment.

5. Blind seems to rate Boukhari. Pardon my French, but if you think Heitinga is a better football player than Escudé, and Boukhari should be a starter for Ajax in midfield rather than Lindenbergh (or anybody else), excuse me, but then you are one serious nutjob.

Conclusion: because of his the things described above and the fact that we have not improved after all in the past ten months (in spite of the fact that Blind was convinced his squad was good enough at the start of the season) Mr Blind is very quickly running out of credit at the moment. I am starting to have very, very serious doubts about him.

I am not saying we should fire him now (I mean: what do we do then?), but if Martin van Geel (who is, by the way, a top bloke) wants to get rid of him at season's end and talk to someone like Henk ten Cate, he has my blessing, no doubt about it.

Okay, that was it for now. Your thoughts please and thank you for listening.

K.

[DanK]

Okay, that was it for now. Your thoughts please and thank you for listening.
K.

Nicely said Mr Ko. You raise some valid points and in all honesty I think I agree with you on all fronts.

I think its fair that a coach tries different things over the season, but when he continually does things that EVERYONE can see is just plain stupid it gets you worried. C'mon I mean Pienaar as a winger?!? Babel as a winger?!? Even trying Rosenberg on the wing...for f*ck sake. If you want a friggin winger, then don't get rid of ones that show promise.

When you want to play in a 4-3-3 formation and your forwards are failing, maybe you need to look at the services they are getting, not just think "hey...lets buy ANOTHER striker!".

It baffles me sometimes what Blind is doing, but the board must surely be thinking hard about his future...question is who can take his place?

[Kowalczyk]

It baffles me sometimes what Blind is doing, but the board must surely be thinking hard about his future...question is who can take his place?

Sacking him during the season would make no sense. What would we do then? Make Ruud Krol the man in charge again? We've fired too many coaches already and firing Blind now won't help.

He must finish the season, but I hope (and think) that Van Geel will evaluate his first full season and come to a negative conclusion. It wouldn't be a bad idea to replace Blind in the summer, preferably with a man like Henk ten Cate, Martin Jol or Michael Laudrup (pretty much the names that were buzzing around in the media when Koeman got axed, and the board eventually chose for Blind).

K.

[Philippe]

I fully agree with you on points 1 to 4.
But in my views the main problem is that for the past two years Ajax sold and bought the wrong players, not to mention key members of the technical staff.
So the question is : who is responsible, the coach, the board, or the chairman ?

[Over Pasanens Head]

Sundays game

Act 1 Scene 1 - The dressing Room just before the Game


Blind: Well lads lets keep the ball rolling as we did in the midweek game, as an away draw in the league at any ground is a very good result

Krol: But boss it was only a friendly against a Erstedivisie side.

Blind: Yeh , alright but to get a draw was still good. Anyway to todays game and I have decided that to confuse the opposition we will play our best central defender as a right back.

Krol: But he was crap there last season boss.

Blind: Yeh, alright but I like Heitinga, he is a nice lad and he likes to play in the middle of defence. Also in midfield we will play with 2 players of the same type just in case one of them is off form and then play Boukhari in front of these in the number 10 playmaking position.

Krol: But boss the bloke just hasn't got it to play in the first team at Ajax and it is unfair on the rest of the team and the fans to play him.

Blind: Yeh, alright but he is such a nice lad and really works hard so just give him one last chance.Also we must play him as I think he was a bit upset that his country, with all their wealth of football talent at their disposal, chose not to select him for the African Nations Cup

Blind: Up front I am going to put Rosenberg out on the wing as a number of fans still cannot recognise him as the middle of the pitch is a long way away from the stands. We must give our stars full exposure so that when they meet the fans in the street, the fans can recognise them and congratulate them on another terrific performance.

Krol: sigh

Blind: If this isn't working then I have a plan whereby I will take off all the ball players and replace them with tall forwards and then give our goalie the instruction to lump the ball forward at every opportunity to them.

Krol: But boss that isn't the Ajax way and we haven't even practised it in training. Anyway none of them are very good in the air as we always practice passing-to-feet football.

Blind: Yeh, alright but NEC won't be expecting this from an Ajax team will they.
If this doesn't work then I have a number of thoughts on how I can change the formation around in the coming weeks. By the law of averages one of the twenty formations or so must work.

Krol: Big sigh

Exit players to the Ajax March and exit fans to the Grolsch Bar.

[Kowalczyk]

*LOL* :D X'D

Brilliant...

K.

[SPL]

I have read the thoughts of those who watch the team and have come to the conclusion that Blind should be sacked now as Krol taking charge until the end of the season cannot do worse!!. The club are now in as poor a state as late 1990's and will have to be rebuilt this summer. The other day I quoted about 12 players to go but added to that it seems Galasek and Grygera wont extend contracts and Rosales could return to Argentina this week.Heitinga would not be a loss either and even poor Babel must be completely pissed off.

For next season Blind has already signed Krohn- Dehli and indicated De Mul will return.These players are reserve standard .

We all wanted Koeman sacked last season but we were still in a better position then than we are now. As I said yesterday we can only look forward to the playoffs , which at present , under a totally clueless coach we may not qualify for.

I would have thought that the players should be highly motivated as alot want to leave and ought to be showing new employers how good they are !!!.

It sums up our players at the moment in this transfer window that the only player who is attracting real attention is Escude.

[jamcocteau]

Ko

Well written piece in my opinion - and each point perfectly valid. By the end of the game yesterday it was actually like watching a Scottish 2nd Division match, honestly, was that bad. Basically lets just punt the ball up the pitch and hope that a striker woll get a nod on to the ball.

Another thing I would like to bring up is why Emmanuelson has now dropped out the starting first team. For me, he was the best player in the first half of the season by miles. Young and made the odd mistake but he looked comfortable on the ball and wasnt scared to run at players and take them on. Yesterday I would have liked to have seen Emmanuelson playing from the start in front of Juanfran in the left midfield role. To me this would have made more sense and at least brought a bit of balance to the team - 2 left footed players playing on the left side. Instead he stuck by Boukhari and it looked to me like he gave him sort of free role at the start. He was all over the pitch but done nothing useful whatsoever. It was like watching an 8 year old kid playing football - following wherever the ball went but always yards behind it - was quite embarassing.

In fact, I actually felt sorry for Boukhari when he was taken off - not for the fact that he had another stinker but the fact that Blind actually left him on the pitch so long. He should have been taken off long before then. Instead Blind left him on when the majority of the crowd were booing and heckling every touch he made. He then gets injured and everybody is clapping an Ajax player being down - now no player should have to go through that, that poor guy must be feeling like shit today and the only person to blame must be Blind. If he had to bring him off earlier, Boukhari would not have to go through that sort of humiliation.

Another thing is the lack of speed - how many times have Ajax scored goals on the break this season - very very few. It always seem to be a very slow build up to any attacks we have - usually giving the opposition plenty time to regroup and get players behind the ball. Ajax are severely lacking a midfielder who can turn defence into attack quickly by moving forward at speed with the ball himself or is able to hit a 50/60 yard ball to an attacker. Galasek yesterday for example I cannot remeber hitting a pass which actually reached one of our players further than 10 metres.

[ferry]

In fact, I actually felt sorry for Boukhari when he was taken off - not for the fact that he had another stinker but the fact that Blind actually left him on the pitch so long. He should have been taken off long before then. Instead Blind left him on when the majority of the crowd were booing and heckling every touch he made. He then gets injured and everybody is clapping an Ajax player being down - now no player should have to go through that, that poor guy must be feeling like shit today and the only person to blame must be Blind. If he had to bring him off earlier, Boukhari would not have to go through that sort of humiliation.

Couldn't agree more. Personally I even think that Blind should have taken Boukhari on the bench already weeks ago. This guy is not able to play well and gets worse every week. I felt sorry for him as well, no Ajax player deserves to be booed out of the game. (because I think his injury wasn't that bad that he needed to be substituted.) Boukhari had an extremely well game against psv for the "JC Schaal", and that's it. I don't see any reason why Blind is putting him in the starting eleven.
It would make so much more sense to put Emanuelson out there in his place...

I was in fever of Blind, I seriously thought he could handle the job. Now I'm having serious doubts... But as said earlier here; if we'd sack him now, who could take over and be an improvement?

[SE6Ajacied]

It sums up our players at the moment in this transfer window that the only player who is attracting real attention is Escude.

No surprise, he's a flaming good player that's why! Is it all going to come out one day that there's some real reason for him being dropped as I can't for the life of me see that being dumped after one bad game against (let's face it) Eredivisie's current no. two makes any sense at all.

Ko, completely agree with you and OPH, you should write scripts - I think this is all going to end very badly for Mr Blind (and on this form I won't be surprised or sorry).

Do folks feel that we can actually get Jol as manager. We've had the debate about which is the "bigger" club (and I agree it's us) but he must be on mega-money at Spurs (unless someone knows differently). I suppose it depends on what he wants most, the £££££'s or the status.

[dws]

Another thing is the lack of speed - how many times have Ajax scored goals on the break this season - very very few. It always seem to be a very slow build up to any attacks we have

Ajax have displayed this problem pretty much since since Van Gaal departed in the summer of '97. We have had only 2 and a half good seasons of football in the past 8 and half seasons , namely: season 97/98 with Morten Olsen and the first 18 months of Koeman's tenure.