21 Apr 2005: Willem II - Ajax

[Kowalczyk]

A bit early, this topic, but this is our semi-final fixture in the Amstel Cup! Thursday 21 April, kick-off time 20:45 CET. Feyenoord and PSV play each other in the other semi. Could be one hell of a final!

K.

[DanK]

A bit early, this topic, but this is our semi-final fixture in the Amstel Cup! Thursday 21 April, kick-off time 20:45 CET. Feyenoord and PSV play each other in the other semi. Could be one hell of a final!

K.

Ajax - Fey would be an awsome final, pity in will be in de kuip. Although it will make the victory even better. :xyxthumbs:

[Kowalczyk]

There were rumors (actually, it wasn't a rumour, it was on the frontpage of Het Parool) that the ones who 'lost' their season tickets on Sunday (we all had to give them to the police) would not be allowed to go to Tilburg for Thursday's semi-final.

According to the Dapp're Strijders fanzine/website this is not true. They report that we will get our tickets back this week and that everyone who has a ticket can go to Tilburg as planned.

Thanks God. Would have been absolutely ridiculous.

K.

[Kowalczyk]

Damn!

AT5 reports that Hatem Trabelsi skipped training this morning due to a knee injury. This injury will surely keep him sidelined on Thursday and possibly longer.

I suggest: Johnny Heitinga as right fullback. He played there for Holland during Euro 2004. I prefer that over playing Nigel de Jong as a right fullback. Midfield works well this way, so let's leave it intact and replace Trabelsi one-on-one. No shifting.

----------------------------- Vonk ---------------------------------------

Heitinga -------- Grygera -------- Escudé ---------- Maxwell ----------

De Jong --------------- Maduro ----------------- Sneijder ------------

Pienaar ----------------- Babel ---------------------- Mitea -----------

That should do!

K.

[jakobg]

I agree on that one. It's always better to change an injured player with one from the bench than switching positions in a winning team. Especially now that the guys finally seem to be back on track.

[carcajou]

I agree on that one. It's always better to change an injured player with one from the bench than switching positions in a winning team. Especially now that the guys finally seem to be back on track.

And there is a natural binding between Heitinga and Nigel so that could be interesting. The big difference is that Johnny is not much of an offensive player... So the right flank will be much less dangerous with Rosales and Trabelsi not playing.

[Blind3]

One positive about our re-configured right side: Kevin Bobson, WII left wing ,has a hamstring injury and ,if Amstelcup.nl can be believed, will not play.i also agree with Ko's proposed elftal.

[Philippe]

Pieanaar as our right winger, I am not sure. De Ridder would be a possibility.

[Kowalczyk]

Pieanaar as our right winger, I am not sure. De Ridder would be a possibility.

Pienaar's been our right winger in the past two games (AZ and Feyenoord) and he was great. So let's not change that now (although I do agree that he's not a right winger for the long run).

K.

[Kowalczyk]

In tonight's game in Tilburg Ajax will have to do without Mauro Rosales, Angelos Charisteas, Hatem Trabelsi, Rasmus Lindgren and, possibly, Tomás Galásek (the latter may return to the bench, but is definitely not 'match fit').

Willem II will also miss several starters, including former Ajacieden Michel Kreek and Kevin Bobson. Coach Robert Maaskant will have to improvise in his defense (Van Nieuwstadt amd Mathijssen are injured) as well as upfront (wingers Bobson and Hadouir are unavailable). Also injured: midfielder Agustien.

K.

[Kowalczyk]

Another injury... referee Jan Wegereef had to be replaced. Instead, the KNVB will send the one and only Roelof Luinge to Tilburg.

Strange to replace an injured referee with a colleague that's suffering from a chronic visual injury. :D

Good ref for cup football, though: always spectacular and utterly unpredictable.

K.

[Blind3]

1:0 Willem II thru Caluwe.We are red,we are white, we are absolute and utter shite. X'C

[BPBlueSox]

How horrible was that? :pukey:

[Over Pasanens Head]

Great f****ing result - NOT.
Apparently from Ko's texts from the game we missed an absolute sh*tload of unmissable chances.
Well at least we can concentrate on the league now that this cup distraction is out of the way. Great thinking lads at a very high strategic level. which is way beyond me.
At least the Rottigdam city council and probably the KNVB will breath a huge sigh of relief.

[Kowalczyk]

So, here I am. Back home.

F##king SH#T!! How in the world is it possible that we f#cked this one up...??? We were the absolutely and totally dominant side throughout. The chances we missed... it is simply unbelievable. Sneijder: two free finishing opportunities, right in front of the goalkeeper. De Jong: face-to-face with the goalie, rebound for Mitea in front of an empty goal... cross-bar. Charisteas: good header, saved by Moens, rebound for Pienaar from close range (while Moens was already on the ground), but he fired against the onlly defender on the goal-line.

We should not only have scored, we should have scored at least five times!

Willem II were never in it - and they scored from the only half-chance they had.

Amazing. And very frustrating. It's 'only' the cup, but I was really looking forward to playing the final and winning it. This SUCKS.

K.

[Philippe]

seen some of it on studiosport this morning :

1- the WII goal : their player was completely on his own, at the penalty spot, when the croos came from the right, terrible defense (Escudé?)
2-incredible miss by Pienaar, alone in front of the goals, manages to send the ball to the only remaining WII player, on the line at the rigut side of their goal, incredible, ridiculous
3- the usual non sense and miss by Charisteas, let's sell this one before it's too late
4-unlucky miss by Mitea hitting the cross bar

Clowns !

[The Purple Cow]

Well I watched the cricket.

Bryan Lara 172 in 224 balls.

Fantastic.

[Kowalczyk]

Match report is up...

http://www.ajax-usa.com/matches/m04-05/ ... i-1-0.html

K.

[GangstaRiB]

How dit wo lose this one? We played well, as Ko said. But a few players were with their minds somewhere else. Heitinga replaced Trabelsi, but did nothing with the space he had. He has reached rock-bottom hopefully, because it can't get any worse from him.

Babel was in love with the ball. and most important, he didn't score again! Everybody is blaming Charri, but babel is certainly not more effective!

For the rest: forget about the Amstel Cup and try to hold on to the second place in de HCE. Which results in Champions Leaque Qualifiers. That's more important now.

[Kowalczyk]

Everybody is blaming Charri, but babel is certainly not more effective!

I don't think Charisteas can be blamed for any of the chances he missed. His first touch was a really good header. Goalie saved.

His best chance was when Sneijder was brought down (should have been a penno!). He had the rebound, but Moens was there almost immediatly and dived in front of Charisteas' feet. That was not a 'must score' opportunity.

The ones who really should have hammered it home with their eyes closed were Sneijder (first half), De Jong (face to face with goalie) and especially Pienaar and Mitea (both rebounds). They could have pissed those across the goal-line.

We should have scored at least four, possibly five or six times. Amazing.

In the Dutch language threads some of the folks seem to think that Ajax played very poorly. That to me is complete bollocks. We played as well as we did against Feyenoord, not as good as against AZ, but better than we did in the recent home game against Willem II. Ajax were very dominant, had several periods of enormous pressure and created a hatful of chances.

We did well - except that the effectivity was 0%...

K.

[GangstaRiB]

About that penalty. Maybe it was better if Charri just moved away from the ball. Therefore it would be obvious that we didn't get advantage. And even Luinge would have to give Ajax a penalty, something he doesn't like to do.

But it doesn't matter now anymore.

About Pienaar his chance: Pienaar is a wonderfull player and very smart. But he lacks power in his legs! Even a 13-year old can shoot harder and faster than him! He should have rammed that rebound into the net....

[carcajou]

About that penalty. Maybe it was better if Charri just moved away from the ball. Therefore it would be obvious that we didn't get advantage. And even Luinge would have to give Ajax a penalty, something he doesn't like to do.

But it doesn't matter now anymore.

About Pienaar his chance: Pienaar is a wonderfull player and very smart. But he lacks power in his legs! Even a 13-year old can shoot harder and faster than him! He should have rammed that rebound into the net....

Yup, this is the first thing that striked me like thunder when I first saw the players back in February 2004 during the Annual AjaxUSA trip to Dam :

The lack of physical strength in the squad...

First the players are dwarves, but not the Tolkien type, the lightweight one.

Players like Rosales, Mitea, Sneijder, Heitinga could use some bench press, dammit !!

I KNOOOOOW that football is not american football and that it's more about technics and quick passing, but how could those players compete with the likes of Alex, Bouma, Venegoor and Kuijt ?

At the end of the game, they've been rammed a hundred times by this kind of defenders and forwards and they're exhausted, so they don't have the lucidity needed to make the good pass (and I don't even talk about the injuries...). Our midfield is crying for some good physically loaded players that can do the job and give the defenders some relief.

So I hope that this smurf policy non sense will stop at some point, because each mythic Ajax team had its bull big guys...

[GangstaRiB]

About that penalty. Maybe it was better if Charri just moved away from the ball. Therefore it would be obvious that we didn't get advantage. And even Luinge would have to give Ajax a penalty, something he doesn't like to do.

But it doesn't matter now anymore.

About Pienaar his chance: Pienaar is a wonderfull player and very smart. But he lacks power in his legs! Even a 13-year old can shoot harder and faster than him! He should have rammed that rebound into the net....

Yup, this is the first thing that striked me like thunder when I first saw the players back in February 2004 during the Annual AjaxUSA trip to Dam :

The lack of physical strength in the squad...

First the players are dwarves, but not the Tolkien type, the lightweight one.

Players like Rosales, Mitea, Sneijder, Heitinga could use some bench press, dammit !!

I KNOOOOOW that football is not american football and that it's more about technics and quick passing, but how could those players compete with the likes of Alex, Bouma, Venegoor and Kuijt ?

At the end of the game, they've been rammed a hundred times by this kind of defenders and forwards and they're exhausted, so they don't have the lucidity needed to make the good pass (and I don't even talk about the injuries...). Our midfield is crying for some good physically loaded players that can do the job and give the defenders some relief.

So I hope that this smurf policy non sense will stop at some point, because each mythic Ajax team had its bull big guys...

Totally right and this was sort of a big issue in the press a while ago. In the Dutch competition it can go right with these light wheight players. The level in the dutch league is permitting that. But in Europe the difference is remarkble. Maybe 3 or 4 players can be like 1.70 m and 70 kilo, but not 8 or 9 of them.

If we have trouble with opponents, generally we can't beat them with though play. Something psv and (less) feyenerd can do.

[aveslacker]

As frustrating as the loss is, considering we all pretty much had the team already in the final, I see positives in it. I can't help it, I was born an optimist.

For one thing, and I admit my opinion is based mostly on second hand information, the general sense that I get is that since Blind has taken the helm of the club, Ajax has regained some of its swagger (which we all know and love and which is part of what makes Ajax what it is). To be sure, there is some way to go in that department, but the difference between Ajax under Koeman and under Blind is palpable.

To that end, I sense that this loss is different from losses under the old regime. Heck, it is different from the victories under the old regime, where basically Ajax's talent surplus and a little luck would do the trick. Sometimes things don't go your way - this happens to every team. Soccer is a funny game. By all accounts, the lads played well, just used up their season quota of missed sitters in one game. But it is encouraging that they generated so many good opportunities.

Furthermore, even though it would have been nice to be in the cup final and get some revenge from PSV, I would rather the club lose this game than one of the remaining league games and risk losing out on guaranteed CL for next season (particularly when you think that they will need some money to offset the loss of anticipated income resulting from Maxwell's injury).

[carcajou]

As frustrating as the loss is, considering we all pretty much had the team already in the final, I see positives in it. I can't help it, I was born an optimist.

For one thing, and I admit my opinion is based mostly on second hand information, the general sense that I get is that since Blind has taken the helm of the club, Ajax has regained some of its swagger (which we all know and love and which is part of what makes Ajax what it is). To be sure, there is some way to go in that department, but the difference between Ajax under Koeman and under Blind is palpable.

To that end, I sense that this loss is different from losses under the old regime. Heck, it is different from the victories under the old regime, where basically Ajax's talent surplus and a little luck would do the trick. Sometimes things don't go your way - this happens to every team. Soccer is a funny game. By all accounts, the lads played well, just used up their season quota of missed sitters in one game. But it is encouraging that they generated so many good opportunities.

Furthermore, even though it would have been nice to be in the cup final and get some revenge from PSV, I would rather the club lose this game than one of the remaining league games and risk losing out on guaranteed CL for next season (particularly when you think that they will need some money to offset the loss of anticipated income resulting from Maxwell's injury).

Well actually nothing's guaranteed.... If we end up being second, we'll have to play two third round games games against some random team. And sometimes you just have bad luck. You end up playing Rosenborg or Moscow, they play the game of their life at home (remember that their championship has been going for like three months already, so they have ryhtm) and they play like starving pitbulls in Amsterdam. And then we're out. See Ave, I'm a natural pessimist (damn me), but I just can't say that it's guaranteed CL, unless two games is what you call "guaranteed CL" ;)