Ajaxtalk

Ajax will try to regroup as a depleted PSV squad comes to Amsterdam this weekend. Still no final word on whether Bergwijn will be moving to Spurs. The Eindhoven team defense is bad and they can't score goals with any consistency. Ajax "should" be able to break out of the current funk they are in.

Good news first - Blind is back in training, Onana seems to have recovered from his shoulder injury, and Ziyech is making good progress. Bad news - Neres is not able to full train yet and his rehab is taking longer than expected.

A must win game especially as Willem and Feyenoord are now 7 points behind and of course AZ level. Eiting for de Jong thank goodness

Finally the breakthrough!

Promes finally puts one away! We’re all over them and it could be 3–0 apart from some lucky saves

Nice first half apart from two injuries. Not sure how it’s only 1–0. You know PSV are going to sneak a goal at some point so we’d better put a handful past them.

Not sure why its 1-0 PSV look weak and woeful in every area.

Last year everyone is healthy for almost the whole season. de Ligt missed a single match and Ziyech maybe 1-2. Eiting was the only long term injury. this season players are dropping like flies.

Nice. It was a bit more of a fight after the break but we never gave PSV a chance and could’ve scored 3 or 4.

Tadić was huge in the second half, did he lose the ball even once?

Relief we won.2nd half perfect stream for 88 mins died and no other stream found . (I remember the Psv game in the first half of the season died with less than 10mins to go!)

Hard fought in the 2nd half and thought we would throw it away.PSV really look woeful in all areas and they can forget 2nd place
and just try and take 3rd place. Babel does not impress and we need Neres back. Thankfully Eiting played and not de Jong ,he had a good game.

A fatigued Ajax held on to beat PSV 1-0 in a match that saw three more players come off with injuries. Promes and Babel were on the bench at the end of the match so maybe their muscle ailments are not serious. Ajax had 27 shots in the match but only 7 on goal. A lot of shots were blocked by a clogged middle in the PSV defense. Ajax were wasteful on 2-3 chances that could have closed the match out. Good to see Eiting put in a full 90 minutes and he looked decent though some of the passes were a little too heavily weighted. The Ajax back line stood firm and PSV really didn't have a hard shot on Onana's goal. February may end up being a long month unless some of the injured players can make a come back.

player ratings:

Onana (6.5) - had to do a lot of kicking from the back to clear balls upfield but didn't make any mistakes in doing so
Tagliafico (7) - solid match with an important clearance in the final minutes of the match
Martinez (7) - stood his ground and did not let anyone get past him
Veltman (6) - OK in the short time he was on the field
Dest (7.5) - MOTM for me with an absolutely top notch performance going forward creating danger and getting back into position when the ball was lost
Eiting (6.5) - very good start to the match but then turnovers started coming more often than not
Gravenberch (6) - pretty quiet but solid enough defending
van de Beek (6.5) - really tired at the end of the match and seemed to have some muscle discomfort
Promes (7) - solid goal and a danger all afternoon until suffering a muscle injury
Babel (7) - better than he has played so far with good ball control
Tadic (7) - kept his head and controlled the ball when it need to be done
Schuurs (7) - very good game coming on for Veltman and he is so good with the ball at his feet
Tarore (6) - OK subbing for Promes
Mazraoui (5.5) - the few touches he had were not pretty

Away to Utrecht next Sunday which is always a challenge.

The Dest incident looked a certain penalty even watching it 3 or 4 times. Schuurs looked good to me and clearly is no worse than Veltman.Think Ziyech will be back for Utrecht but Daley wont be rushed.

SPL schreef: ↑

zo feb 02, 2020 7:10 pm

The Dest incident looked a certain penalty even watching it 3 or 4 times. Schuurs looked good to me and clearly is no worse than Veltman.Think Ziyech will be back for Utrecht but Daley wont be rushed.

Bas Nijhuis was on VAR for the match and I have always thought him to be a lazy official. He might have deferred to Kuipers on this call the same way they defer to CRs in the English Premier League. I thought it was a stone cold penalty band the only way it would not have been is if the PSV defender got the ball along with contact but I certainly did not see that. Perhaps the VAR feed did.

I hope Promes and Babel aren't badly hurt - since they were back on the bench in the 2nd half. Eiting is growing in confidence and had a few outstanding passes today.

We should've buried this game in the 1st half, but got unlucky on a few shots and their keeper made some very lucky saves.

The biggest thing I noticed was that Tadic killed the game by taking the ball to the corner for the last 30 seconds. At least that's a lesson learned from the terrible last 30s against Spurs.

We will get a few of our players back over the next several weeks and that will definitely add a much needed boost to this group.

SPL schreef:The Dest incident looked a certain penalty even watching it 3 or 4 times. Schuurs looked good to me and clearly is no worse than Veltman.Think Ziyech will be back for Utrecht but Daley wont be rushed.

They showed the replay a few times after the match on the Dutch feed and there was no question. It was a clear penalty. No idea why the VAR crew ignored it.

Yes and how is that not a penalty or even a question to the VAR crew?

Amol schreef: ↑

zo feb 02, 2020 11:11 pm

Yes and how is that not a penalty or even a question to the VAR crew?

Kuipers said after the match it should have been a PK.

Orange14 schreef: ↑

ma feb 03, 2020 2:09 pm

Amol schreef: ↑

zo feb 02, 2020 11:11 pm

Yes and how is that not a penalty or even a question to the VAR crew?

Kuipers said after the match it should have been a PK.

I'm glad he accepted his mistake, but a bit too late.