03 Nov 2012: Ajax - Vitesse

[Orange14]

Worst performance by an Ajax team in quite some time. Aimless passes and no clue on who the dangerous player for Vitesse (hint: Bony and you need to mark him closely).

Player Ratings:

Vermeer (6) - very little to do as the ball was seldom at his end of the field
Blind (5) - decent going forward but lost his winger several times; fortunate not to have been scored upon
Denswil (4.5) - totally missed marking his man when it really counted
Alderwiereld (5) - how many times did he try to pass over the defense? How many times was it sucessful?
van Rhijn (5) - good going forward, terrible defending
Poulsen (5) - weak back pass and was fortunate not to have led to a score; did a decent job defending but maybe could have been closer to Bony on the 1st goal
Schöne (5.5) - OK match but didn't step it up when he needed to
Eriksen (6) - best of the mediocre bunch, really looked to spring somebody clear
Babel (4.5) - worst match since his return; weak on the ball and wild with the shot, surprised he wasn't subbed off
de Jong (6) - second best player on the pitch (not saying much), had the only hard shot on Velthuizen
Sana (4.5) - lost possession too many times
Fischer (5) - very active but that's not saying much, did have one good through pass
Boerrigter (5) - didn't even touch the ball until the last couple of minutes in the match

Off to Manchester for the Tuesday CL fixture now and then Zwolle in the league. Maybe they will finally win a league match.

[Orange14]

Did we make any chances in that entire game?

de Jong had the one shot from the top of the box that was swerving away from Velthuizen but he punched it out. Otherwise every other shot was just a soft shot that you or I could have saved.

[SPL]

fair markings although Boerrigter did zero for me. Mind with sopcast freezing up a bit in the first half I watched nearly all the 2nd half on firstrow ,which was very clear but I can only get a decent stream on small screen ,however I think in big screen it would have looked just as crap.

This week I think Man city may turn it on against us as they got a dreadful press the other week and will want to put us in our place.

[Amol]

fair markings although Boerrigter did zero for me. Mind with sopcast freezing up a bit in the first half I watched nearly all the 2nd half on firstrow ,which was very clear but I can only get a decent stream on small screen ,however I think in big screen it would have looked just as crap.

I saw him (amongst others) being crap in HD. You didn't miss much

[Kowalczyk]

Worst performance by an Ajax team in quite some time.

Yes.

Well-deserved win for a Vitesse team that was simply better. More solid.

K.

[SPL]

Leaving aside our poor football ,its ok to pass but the object is to score , I have said we do not have a strong enough squad and in fact only 12 players have made up the vast majority of our games .

Vermeer, VRhijn,Alderweireld,Moisander,Blind Schone Poulsen deJong Eriksen Sana Babel Boerrigter.

We have used a load of others as subs or the odd game but that is basically our senior squad of whom Poulsen Boerrigter and Sana are not good enough for this team imo. Boerrigter has not played well since his injury and I believe he is not fit.Poulsen seems to be a 5th defender and we really do miss Anita,hes in a different class.Sana is no better than Lukoki who is 3 years younger and not long out the youth. The rest are all ok but apart from Eriksen are not going to be top quality. Ok VRhijn may well be but even he has been disappointing this season with his defending.

The new way of youth will take time and we have over the last few years paid over the odds ,wages wise especially,but we still need to buy players as our own Dutch youth is not good enough at present.Maybe we need better scouting especially at buying players.Leaving aside the joke called Sulejmani,we have paid over 4m for3 players ,Moisander is no Vertonghen ,but is ok for the money.Cillessen is 2nd goalie and already saying he may go on loan next season.Finally Sigthorsson has barely been fit whilst Vitesse have found Bony for nothing .

Given our 2nd eleven struggled to beat Sneek I see the rest of this season as a tough struggle. We usually do better after Christmas but I really do not think the above 12 regulars with Enoh and maybe a fit Siggy making up what is already a 10 point gap.

One last observation,clearly with lack of any mention of contract extensions we can take it as read that Toby and Christian will leave next summer. Mind I had better not start on that subject.

[Orange14]

@SPL - I think you have identified the key problems with the club and I'll weigh in briefly on my observation. Because we start a relatively small team, pressing the opponent is critical. We did a better job of this yesterday and I think we were quite good in preventing Vitesse from organizing anything and moving the ball up field (they contained van Ginkel very well and he's been mentioned as one of the new youngsters for the NT). Unfortunately, Poulsen is not quick enough anymore for this type of game but he is what we have; Enoh is quick but foul prone. de Jong cannot press in the midfield as he is also not quick enough. I think this is where de Boer wants to take the team. Denswil was very good on the ball and I grant him the rookie mistake of losing his mark; that happens to every player. The problem is that this team really has no margin for error.

I agree about Boerrigter, I don't think he is anywhere near the player he was last season and maybe he never will be which is really too bad. In retrospect maybe it was not wise to transfer Ozbilitz as we are really short of wing players who can make a difference. I don't know what value Sigthorrson will bring to the team when he returns as it will mean a different style of play.

I always expect us to win every match and am sometimes (this year more than sometimes) disappointed but there is always the next match to look forward to. We certainly can qualify for the CL by marching through our pool and winning the damn thing like Chelsea did last year though this is not likely.

[Philippe]

Worst season start since 2005.

[Jinne]

.Finally Sigthorsson has barely been fit whilst Vitesse have found Bony for nothing .

They paid 4M for him, so almost in the same league as Sigi.

[SPL]

Jinne thanks for putting me right on Bony.

[paladinby]

A player like Bony will not be useful for De Boer. De Boer is a huge Barca's fan and is trying to build a team that plays that style. I think that this direction is completely wrong given the economical differences between Ajax and Barcelona. Our transfers were disastrous for years which won't help also. We don't have any room for mistake in that area.

[Philippe]

Man of the match :