06 Nov 2012: Manchester City FC - Ajax

[SE6Ajacied]

Also love to see and HEAR the away supporters.

Oh yu've got the same sound as here. Would be interesting to know if we're really that loud at the ground or whether it's just where the TV microphones are.....

[King Litti]

Fuck, that was greedy by Ficher. He should have passed.

[Tom_]

Disappointing not to win, but a great outcome nonetheless

[Jojo]

We were very lucky at the end, but i'll take that!!!!

[Frans]

No chance for Philippe to complain about refereeing conspiracies tonight

[Van basten]

Van Rijn, are u stupid?

[Tom_]

Madrid equalized against Dortmund, too

[paladinby]

Fishcer tried to make a hero of himself and it didn't work. Well at least he's got some CL expierience. The only thing i liked about MC is their players size. Two goals they scored are a compliment to the size and skill of their players. I don't think there's anyone to blame in the goals we conceded - we were just outplayed and outsized there.

Still, that was a good fight though I'd like our wingers to be more productive.

[paladinby]

No chance for Philippe to complain about refereeing conspiracies tonight

C'mon, that ref missed a direct red card for Aguero on De Jong in the dying minutes, yet there are whines about mysterious penalty from English commentators. I watched some English stream.

[King Litti]

[quote="King Litti"] who knows. Maybe a hard fought point or even points will be just the thing to jump start our team.

We did fight hard. Every single player. Poulsen played like I hoped he would when he came to Ajax. He was tough to beat and even passed the ball quite well. Point deserved. The offside was a true blessing. Hope this will boost the player morale. We need points from Swolle. The home game against Dortmund will be huge. Can't wait.

[Orange14]

Well deserved draw as Ajax withstood a ton of pressure throughout the half. Some good defending and they kept a high line which led to several off side calls on ManCity. Maybe van Rhijn gets called for a grab on Balotelli some other day but it didn't happen today. The team is still a little too light weight to play against clubs like this and they don't have the quickness of passing to control possession as much as they need to. Still it's difficult to be too picky when we get a result on the road. Team stands third and with the Dortmund draw at Madrid it is still a tight group. Cheers to valiant players who gave their all today.

Player Ratings:

Vermeer (7) - most of the saves were ones that he should have made and did. Got caught out of the goal mouth once and was lucky not to have been punished; kicked poorly but that's no surprise
Blind (6) - lost his man on a couple of occasions and once was caught way up field and didn't get back into position, good going forward and gave as good as he got
Moisander (7) - made a couple of really good plays inside the box to break up ManCity chances
Alderwiereld (7) - another solid match on defense
van Rhijn (6.5) - can't fault him on the Toure goal but zoned out a couple of times on defense, good going forward and delivered a wicked cross but nobody was crashing the goal
Poulsen (7.5) - really solid match today, played physical and did a much better job passing the ball and moving forward
Schöne (6.5) - got pushed around too much but that's understandable given his stature
de Jong (7.5) - two well taken goals and a couple of other good shots as well, moved well on the pitch creating some nice passing lanes
Babel (6) - tracked back and defended well but was weak on the ball, not really passing when he should have
Eriksen (7.5) - active all over the pitch and possessed the ball well
Boerrigter (6.5) - probably playing because of his physical strength but on the off wing, pretty decent match and did his defensive duties
Enoh (7) - came on and did just what needed to be done defensively, good job after the long layoff
Fischer (6.5) - nice substitution when Poulsen picked up the Yellow card, very active and added some speed to a tired squad
Sans (NR) - not on long enough

Good job tonight and now back to the league for a couple of matches against teams at the bottom of the table. Let's hope that they can right the ship in these contests. We are on track to qualify for the knockout round in the CL with wins over Madrid and Dortmund!!

[Orange14]

The off side call on the Aguero goal was the correct call. It was not on Aguero but Kolarov who was clearly off; even the English match announcers agreed with that one. van Rhijn could have been called for a penalty but I've seen these not given as well.

EDIT: I was not impressed with the Danish officiating crew. I thought some more Yellow cards should have been given for rough play.

[SE6Ajacied]

I watched some English stream.

The ITV commentators are not known for their deftness. Andy Townsend (ex Republic of Ireland) is known for his particular pearls of wisdom. He said tonight that Ballotelli hasn't been playing that well although he always plays better in a blue (ie Italy) shirt......

[Cruijff]

Also love to see and HEAR the away supporters.

Oh yu've got the same sound as here. Would be interesting to know if we're really that loud at the ground or whether it's just where the TV microphones are.....

The Telegraph says the Ajax fans were responsible for the decibel levels in the stadium.

[SPL]

fine performance tonight and we deserved to get a draw . OK a bit of luck at the end but every player did his job.

The noise and singing from the Ajax fans was superb ,must be the best singing fans in the world.

One final thing . 87 mins gone 2-2 holding on for a draw defensive midfielder goes off so what does Ajax do ,put on an 18 year old winger and still go for the win.Thats why Ajax are different and so blooming special.No one else would have done that.

[Tom_]

Team stands third and with the Dortmund draw at Madrid it is still a tight group.

It seems to me from looking at the table that any two teams could go through, and in fact anyone could still finish top (and bottom). But it's hard to see City beating both RM and Dortmund if they continue to play like that and I think 1 more point will probably get us third place. Of course we could also still be in the CL in Jan but we will need a win. It could well come down to the game against Dortmund in the ArenA.

[Philippe]

Thanks to all the guys, proud of you !

The noise and singing from the Ajax fans was superb ,must be the best singing fans in the world.

One final thing . 87 mins gone 2-2 holding on for a draw defensive midfielder goes off so what does Ajax do ,put on an 18 year old winger and still go for the win.Thats why Ajax are different and so blooming special.No one else would have done that.

Yes indeed !

Everyone played well, with a special mention to De Jong of course. Great tactical playing, congratulations to Frank.

Laugh of the evening with Mancini at the very end. Yes it was a penalty, but yes the game was over, the 3mn extratime were gone. Game over for you, Mancini, and for your 400 M€ fatcats.

Since Real Mad did not do the job, CL is over for us now. But I'm looking forward to the Ajax-Dortmund game. We'll "overwinter in Europa" but in the Europa League.

[Manneken Pis]

Yes it was a penalty

Its' true a "weaker" ref could have give a penalty but as you say time was up and anyway Balotelli had van Rijhn by the neck.

Great performance, particularly when we were circulating the ball with speed and precision in the first half.

One negative for me was Babel, his first touch was awful, and virtually every attack he was part of broke down.

Also, Erikssen faded at the end of the second half, after a great first 65 minutes.

[Kowalczyk]

Oh well, we had two goals disallowed against Real Madrid once... Happened to us before, now it happened to them.

This was a great performance. Something to be proud of.

Now let's fuck up against PEC Zwolle!

K.

[Philippe]

The clown declared : "For now we are finished. We have two more difficult games left, which we have to try and win," he said. "I always believe in my team, but now it is very difficult. If we win our next two games and go through with eight points, then we will win the Champions League. That will be our destiny."

And then unexpectedly admits :
“…but probably this is not our moment in the Champions League. Perhaps Dortmund and Real Madrid are better than us, maybe Ajax also."
Perhaps.

[King Litti]

Easy to say as a Ajax fan, but the refereeing was spot on in the end. Yes, it was Kolarov who was offside (not much, but still was) before the Aguero goal and what comes to the penaty, well Van Rhijn did grab his shirt a little which was stupid because it gave Balotelli a chance to do a ridiculous and desperate dive. Like Manneken Pis wrote a weaker ref might have been fooled but it would not have been fair because that kind of stuff happens all the time inside the box.

Going through to the best 16 is still possible but extremely hard. Even if we win Dortmund we would still need points from Santiago Bernabeu, right? Even qualifying to the E.L would be heroic from such a tough group.

[Philippe]

Mancini yesterday :


Mancini the day after :

[ajaxcolombia]

Good things happen when you decide to play decent corner kicks

[Philippe]

Guidetti's boasting did not bring luck to City...
http://www.telegraaf.nl/telesport/voetb ... jax__.html

[SPL]

Man City should not have had that last free kick as Siem had just been badly tackled which all the pro Man City lovers including the commentary team overlooked .

I didn't get time to really post last night but Siem was probably our MOM but I did think Poulsen had his best game for us.Since having a go at Vermeer after Heracles he has put in some great saves including last night. Both wingers defended well although not so much attacking wise.

At the end I was happy with the result although we may now have to play Europa league as the best team in England could only get 1 point against us in 2 games.If only we had held on in Dortmund we could have been looking at finishing in the top 2 !!

Again I was proud of my team and what a bunch of supporters.They completely outsung the Abu Dhabi Utd fans ( my Man U supporting Dutch cousin's name for them) Surely there cannot be any other fans anywhere to compare with ours especially when singing 3 Little Birdies.