16 Mar 2014: NAC Breda - Ajax

[rjf1]

He's got to get Serero off the pitch -- put anyone on instead, I don't care who.

[Dave the mac]

de Sa on for Kishna, who did next to nothing...wtf?

[Dave the mac]

Gezz...another uninspired crap game. Hardly looking like champions.

[ajaxcolombia]

trying....not....to....hit...panic....button

[saddlerian]

I can only say...why are they going back to Amsterdam....they couldn't score in an effing brothel!!! I was going to book couple of flights for the April matches....no chance now, keeping my cash in the bank!! It just seems a waste of money folowing them at the moment...NO VALUE!!!!

No ideas...at the moment, they seem just a boring second rate team....

Can't say any more...just so pissed off!!!

[SPL]

Utter complete clueless football by Ajax but having played another piss poor game we are 7 points clear and finish the weekend in a better position.

Our attack is not good enough and we may as well play Meleg and Becker from our Jong team.

[Orange14]

This team is really bad worse than average. It also looked like FdB went straight to the changing room and didn't congratulate the NAC trainer, really bad on his part IMO. The only players that even distinguished themselves at all were Cillessen and Poulsen. Everyone else was so poor that they did not even deserve to wear the shirt today. Terrible that we are even in first place. Didn't think much of the officiating today; really don't understand how Veltman go the Yellow card as he was past the player when the player tripped. Can't call that a foul!

Player Ratings:

Cillessen (6.5) - let down by his defense but made two critical saves to keep the clean sheet and he's going to have to do a lot more of this
Blind (5) - average at best
Moisander (5.5) - good defensive play in the first half to prevent a score but too many worthless long balls
Veltman (5) - aveage at best
van Rhijn (4.5) - defensively below average and did nothing going forward
Poulsen (6) - only one who really wanted to win today
Klaassen (3.5) - few touches and looked like a quick de Jong in midfield
Serero (3) - gets a point for a good defensive play to prevent a break in on Cillessen otherwise was horrible, so lightweight that he drew fouls for falling over
Kishna (3) - hope he learned that he cannot beat three players
de Jong (NR) - came off too early to warrant any rating
Schöne (4.5) - shade below average which makes him the best of the front line players
Sigthorsson (3) - had one shot on goal but otherwise terrible; he is so poor on the ball that it's pathetic to watch
de Sa (4.5) - one trick pony charging to the end line trying to cross; it worked twice but the delivery was poor; did put in a lot of effort
Bojan (4) - why are we even paying him?

I'm seriously wondering why I even watch this team play; there are schoolboy clubs that perform much better. Disgusting plain and simple!

[saddlerian]

To think that I wasted my time and money watching this crap today when my "home" club, Agios Nikolaos, who are bottom of Greece 2F - desperately needing some points, played the old 2-3-5 system, REAL ATTACKING FOOTBALL.....THEY WON...3-2!!!!

Maybe Frank should take a short break here in Crete!!!!!

[SPL]

NAC were playing mostly in the 2nd half with 11 behind the ball and even a team with decent attackers would struggle to break them down. Most of our attack will be gone in the summer ie Siem wants to leave and Siggy also. Bojan adds nothing and we may as well send him home now. Schone is not a forward and de Sa is no better than Becker from the Jong and El Ghazi and Acolatse from the A1 youth.

Lets just go for youth and have Becker Meleg and Kishna up front.

[saddlerian]

NAC were playing mostly in the 2nd half with 11 behind the ball and even a team with decent attackers would struggle to break them down.

Sorry, but I disagree with this!! How the bloody hell are you going to break a defence down if you take 1 step forwards and then 2 steps backwards? All this crap about the Ajax style of recycling the ball....the EU must pay Ajax millions for their efforts recycling....unfortunately the recycled material always seems to yield the same crap!!!!

[SPL]

Apart from AZ, when we had a great 2nd half, we have not scored more than 2 goals in a league game from open play since early December and even with ADO ,RKC and NEC to come this team do not look like scoring more than 2 in a game again this season. Mind with those 3 games we may get a couple of wins which will still be enough to finish top , some how.

[ajaxcolombia]

My call to have duarte as a starter is more of a statement about serero than duarte being an actual solution. I really love fantasizing about how I would manage the team but we've played so badly I'm wondering if there is a fix. Only positive from this game was the fact that poulsen can actually be moe than an enforcer. But that's it.

[SPL]

Ian I was not trying to excuse them we were piss poor.When NAC did stick most behind the ball a better attack than ours may have struggled a bit .Sadly we were completely clueless.

[saddlerian]

Yes, Steve...totally clueless!! I'm almost at the end of my tether with them...my season card WILL NOT be renewed next season...if I do venture into Amsterdam, I'll pick a ticket up at the office...it might be the 4 title in a row, but the entertainment value is declining rapidly!!!

[SPL]

Perhaps its a relief we have a break next weekend

[saddlerian]

Yes, it'll be a nice break...I'm over in UK to watch the mighty Walsall against Orient, then finishing the night off watching The Stranglers in Birmingham, part of their 40th anniversary Tour....really looking forward to it!!!

[Orange14]

The comments are all appropriate but the blunt fact is that we simply do not have five front players who 1) know what to do and 2) have the capacity to do it. Part of it is the hand that FdB was dealt when Eriksen left and the other part is tactics. I don't care whether it is Poulsen or Blind as the holding midfielder both are decent enough for the job though Poulsen cannot play a full 90 minutes any longer. The problem is that the other five players regardless of who they are (Duarte aside as he has not played much this season because of the injury) are simply clueless. Serero and Klaassen don't move around at all; there were several times in the last 20 minutes where I was looking at Serero just standing about 10m inside the halfway line just looking at Veltman, Moisander, and Poulsen/Schöne wondering what he should do. He just doesn't move to open spaces. Same thing can be said for Klaassen though I cut him a bit of a break as he is not being asked to do this by FdB (which is really wrong from a tactical point of view). When you combine this with mediocre fullback play (van Rhijn very rarely goes forward at all) and a striker who is very poor on the ball (Sigthorsson) it's easy to see why even mediocre teams can keep this team from getting any scoring chances. I've said it since December that this club would have to win lots of 1-0 matches to repeat as title champions and the last two matches are clear proof of this.

[Philippe]

Sending Hoesen away on loan was wrong decision. Let's get him back at the end of the season.

[SPL]

Agree about Hoesen.I am not sure he is going to make it with us but he would be a better player in this team than Siggy or Siem.Mind with Klaassen looking jaded and Serero simply not good enough we have problems in midfield.

We are all gloom and doom after 2 poor draws but we are still a meer 7 points clear and if we avoid defeat v Twente and Vitesse then a couple of more wins in the other 4 games will see us champs. Twente ,Vitesse and Fword are all dropping points regularly , and PSV after 7 wins in a row will lose to a low place team soon.

Have the faith guys,mind it wont be pretty as we struggle to score goals.

[souras84]

No De Jong till, I don't know when. I am afraid that it is a possibility we might lose the championship.
Hoesen never plays at paok and it's a sad situation