22 FEB 2015 Willem II - Ajax Match Day 24

[Cruijff]

De Boer gets frustrated. Calls the referee "een achterlijke lul".

[Cruijff]

De Boer gets frustrated. Calls the referee "een achterlijke lul".

[SPL]

El Ghazi should have scored

[Orange14]

Ajax are way too slow on the ball and passing. This is not all due to Thursday's match. Story of the season so far.

[Orange14]

Dodged a big bullet there. Willem II should have won it on that break away.

[Orange14]

Off to a baby naming after the game. Player ratings will come later this afternoon.

[Dave the mac]

Van Rijn...what a clown.

[Orange14]

Perfectly awful performance. Molasses in February flow faster than this team plays.

[Van basten]

Another impressive performance.

[souras84]

We REALLY need to change the way we play. Perhaps it's time for Frank to move on...

[Amol]

Wow. We were lucky to escape with a draw.

[Dave the mac]

A horrible result.... Credit to Willem, they wanted it more. We've seen a lot of that this season.

[Cruijff]

Wow. We were lucky to escape with a draw.

I agree.

We played in a real SLOWWWWW tempo.

But Orange14: before you give really low marks. Keep in mind that Willem II is a good team with dangerous players like Ondaan, Armenteros, Sahar, Cabral, Braber and Peters.

And of course Mitchell Dijks who's always dangerous. Dangerous for his own team mates, for your knees and for your ankles.

[saddlerian]

VERY DISAPPOINTING.....passing slow, NO spacial awareness....ALWAYS trying to make the most difficult negative pass, rarely looking for the forward pass........need I go on?

This was a below average performance from a below average team....new tactics/method of play needed!! Too many players had an "off" day....still need new left back, even though Boilsen WOULD NOT have gifted their goal!!!

Off to the pub....had enough of this crap!

[SPL]

Dreadful performance again. Apart from El Ghazi's one on one with the goalie we never looked like scoring in the 2nd half.

Our play is too slow and sluggish and even I am wondering whether we are even good enough to finish 2nd.

FDB says we need to buy an attacker or midfielder but our defence is just poor. Moisander is off and Boilesen can go with him.Viegever is ok for the bench and I cannot believe we cannot get a better player than V d Hoorn.

Apart from those last 20 mins v Twente when we had 2 wingers taking on the fullbacks we have played rubbish since way before Christmas.

Not sure FDB can turn us around and even I wonder whether he should move on in the summer.His tactics at the moment are poor.

PS Why didn't Kishna come on

[SPL]

Agree with Ian ,Boilesen would not have gifted the goal ,he would not have been back defending. Dijks is nothing special but still as good as either Viegever or Boilesen.

[Ayman]

Frank de Boer has to go, Bring in Wim Jonk, Managers that come in half way through the season usually do well in the first season, and since we are bound for second place, there would be hope for a good run in the Europa League. Not with Frank de Boer at the helm though

[Ayman]

Agreed we do have a problem at Left back. Viergever looks uncomfortable playing there. Boilesen is good at attacking but not defending. Riedewald is too young. Don't even think about Damien Van Bruggen, he is a left sided centre back and has yet to make his debut.

[SPL]

We can get away on the right side of defence with V Rhijn ,and Tete(if Raiola lets him stay) and Veltman with V d Hoorn as back up but we need to buy players for the left side. Moisander is going ,Boilesen cannot defend and should go. Riedewald is too young and not sure what position he is going to play. Viegever is ok as back up but like V d Hoorn imo not up to Ajax standards. I don't rate either but I quess we cannot replace them as back ups so they might have to stay for another year .(No other left footed youths ready to come through at present apart from Riedewald.)

Not saying those right sided defenders are great but they are adequate the left sided are poor. IF FDB thinks our defence is ok without Moisnader ,who is poor and not worth his place, then sadly he should leave and let someone else take over ,possibly not from out TH.

[Cruijff]

Good self reflection from El Ghazi.

In interview after the match he said he should have scored several of his 3 open chances so his personal opinion is that he is to blaim for dropping points in Tilburg.

[Orange14]

Sorry for the delay and I'm sure some of you are off enjoying your Sunday night. As a supporter, I expect my team to go out and play good football and win every match. Ajax did neither this afternoon (morning here in the US). This team is way to hesitant in possession (look at even the simple passes between van der Hoorn and Moisander, they seem to look at one another for five seconds or more before making even a 15 meter pass). When they finally have decided on a pass to make it's way too soft allowing Willem II defenders all the time in the world to react. Of course this has been a problem all season long and one wonders which of the following is the reason: a) the players just don't have enough quality on the ball and cannot play an up tempo passing game, b) they are hesitant because of the fear of making a mistake, or c) FdB has not put in the right kind of tactics or drills to improve things. I honestly do not know which of these three is the right answer. Perhaps it's a combination of all of them.

Of course we have a very young squad and today were a bit unfortunate to get the second needed goal. Even so watching this team is like anticipating a trip to the dentist in the movie Marathon Man (as played by Sir Lawrence Olivier) painful to the point of avoidance. My anticipation of a win is always tempered by the realization that somebody will cock up and a cheap goal for the opposition will result (though truthfully, Viergever's miscue was nowhere as bad as Dani Alves's in yesterday's Barca match that will probably cost them any chance at winning La Liga). Additionally, it's astounding how positionally poor this team has been on defense all season long. Maybe the constant shifting of players to new positions or the lack of Blind/Poulsen as a DM; it's hard to say other than top rank football clubs absolutely do not give up cheap goals.

I'm not going to say anything about FdB's substitutions (they have been bad all season long) or match selection (Klaassen as DM and Bazoer up front). Only he knows the reason and he usually does not say.

Props to Willem II who gave up a goal and then roared back with a vengance. They should have won the match in the dying moments when they had a virtual 3 on 1 break in on Cillessen.

One final thing - these guys don't play to the whistle. Someone goes down and stays down surprised that Kevin Blom hasn't called a foul. I counted a half dozen times where players just sat there letting Willem II move up the field. NOT GOOD!!!

Player Ratings:

Cillessen (6) - unlike the Legia match he had virtually nothing to do today
Viergever (3.5) - goodness gracious, get the ball into touch don't finesse in the box; he also had some other miscues - not even an average performance
Moisander (6) - decent match from him and when Ajax went to a 3 man back line he did try hard to get the ball upfield and his passes were the strongest of anyone on the pitch
van der Hoorn (5.5) - had several nice interventions and too bad he didn't sweep the ball a little further out on the goal scoring play
van Rhijn (5) - average, nothing more nothing less
Klassen (6.5) - thought he had a very strong game as DM, working hard to intervene
Bazoer (6) - decent performance again today
Sinkgraven (4.5) - very disappointing, weak passes and losing the ball on several occasions; at first I thought he was masquerading as Andersen only to realize that Andersen was still on the substitutes bench
Schöne (5.5) - would have been higher except for the woeful miss on the el Ghazi post rebound
Milik (6) - decent posession all game long and active all over the field
el Ghazi (5.5) - good movement but when you are in on the keeper the ball has to go into the back of the net
Serero (5.5) - drew lots of fouls again today which was a plus but not much else
Zivkovic (5) - did he even have a touch on the ball?
Andersen (5) - typical Andersen average game, soft passes and not much ball posession

Tough week coming up with trips to Warsaw and Eindhoven. Ajax will win both matches convincingly because as a supporter this is my belief!!

[Tom_]

It seems de Boer said in the post-match interview that he saw "the best Ajax he'd seen in recent weeks" and we deserved to win. So either he's crazy or he just wants to do a PR job in the interview, but is he actually addressing the problem with our play? Not that I know what the answer would be, I still think we need 4 midfielders if we are going to insist on the slow passing style. Time and time again we get stopped in midfield where we are outnumbered and we don't have the quality and speed to break through.

[Cruijff]

After some matches De Boer is 'watching' really one-sided and it seems that this 'blind spot' of him becomes worse and worse.

I agree with him that there were plenty very fine attacks, mostly in the first half with Schöne, Van Rhijn and El Ghazi involved.

I really disagree with the rest of what Frank is saying, because it was in fact a shit game.

[SPL]

Not for the first time a reasonable first half but then we are non existant in the 2nd. We are lucky they missed that sitter in 89 min because we should have lost this game.

Loads of criticism of FDB not putting Kishna on .Well he played 90 mins last Sunday ,75 mins v Legia so he was never going to start given his injury history and youth but when you are struggling to break down the other team and try and get a winner who on earth would you put Andersen on ,when he has not played for about 3weeks,and leave Kishna,who can turn a game, on the bench.

FDB has made some odd sub decisions ie Zimling came on v Vitesse when we were 1-0 down ! The football has been poor to watch this season but that is down to the fact the players are not good enough. Too many kids who are not ready but lack of quality experience in the team.

We need to buy 2or 3 decent older players. I think Sinkgraven ,even though poor yesterday,will turn out agood buy but back in January a tough experienced DM was needed not some fancy dan kid .

PS.I think we should all try and look at tomorrows U19 v Roma.18.30 KO on Fox tv so streams available. They have already looked a lot better over 2 games v Barca kids and took PSG apart. They play proper Ajax football and hopefully the 3 hugh talents V d Beek,Cerny and little Nouri will turn it on.

[Orange14]

There is a great Japanese post WWII film, Rashomon, by the great director Akira Kurosawa where the same event is told from the vantage point of four individuals. Of course each one sees things differently. I suspect that we are encountering our own version of the Rashomon Effect (good discussion is on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashomon_effect ). The only other possibility is that FdB is suffering from some kind of delusional syndrome.