13 AUG 2016 Ajax - Roda Match Day 2

[Amol]

Come on Traore. Dolberg would've put that in the back of the net for his first hattrick.

[Tom_]

Terrible second half. Got what was deserved

[Amol]

Terrible second half. Got what was deserved

You knew that was coming. But the last two free kicks should never have been given, Tete didn't really foul and Riedewald never touched Peppen.

[Orange14]

Mercifully my stream kept breaking up right after the horrible call on Tete. No way was that a foul on him. I didn't see the tying goal very well other than someone totally missed their marker. Whatever was Riedewald thinking launching a sliding challenge from 5 meters away. I guess there might have also been a hand ball by Roda.

Off to the movies. Don't know if I will do player ratings as my stream was so bad that I probably only saw 2/3 of the match.

[King Litti]

Oh, man. We should have been able to make it 3-1 and kill this game.There was enough chances. Got a bit sloppy and paid the ultimate price. We were the better side though, no doubt, but only the goals count.

Same concerns as with FdB. We can't utilize the possession to create enough goals and we're vulnerable in defense. Can't afford to lose two points like this at home.

[saddlerian]

I must have been one of the unlucky one's as I had a perfect stream here in Greece....but 2-2 against Roda...at HOME, is NOT good enough!!
There was little creativity in midfield...in fact, the only creativity was evident when Youness came on.....why isn't he a starter if he's got his kit on???
I hope that Sanchez proves to be a little better as he showed too much of that EPL "sidefoot" pass...too deliberate...Ajax defenders shouldn't have to think where the ball is...just where it's going!!! He's one to watch...possibly the coaches picked up on that!!!!
There just wasn't enough "umph" in this performance....it was a very low key affair... Last week, I'd give about 6 out of 10....today I'd give just 5 out of 10....now, which way is that going????
Come on Bosz, last week someone said that you'd got "balls of steel"....prove that you've got the ability to lift this group of players,,,,and, for Gods' sake, play them where they're best!!!!! You looked VERY WEAK on the bench tonight!!!!

[SPL]

Very poor 2nd half utter rubbish. The defence was weak,Sanchez is not ready for our first team after only a week in the city and cannot communicate.I will stick to saying de LIgt would have been better .No creativity in midfield as usual and El Ghazi a waste of space.

We did not deserve a win. Dolberg superb finishing.

[King Litti]

Why not play Sinkgraven in midfield instead of Bazoer? That would bring more speed and creativity to midfield and keep Younes on the wing. Bazoer is more of a physical presence for sure compared to Sinkgraven, but I don't think we really need that at least against average Eredivisie teams.

[Tom_]

We seem to have a MF problem. Three players who neither moved the ball quickly enough nor snuffed out counter attacks. Would like to see a MF of Riedewald, vd Beek and Klaassen.

What is it about Gudelj that we don't know? Does he smash shots in from 40 m in training? Honestly have never worked out *why* he's at Ajax, or why he gets picked...

[SPL]

I am no Serero fan but Gudelj is no better certainly not good enough for our team and gives nothing to the side.

[Orange14]

Just like last year the midfield is really bad. Bazoer was the best of the sorry lot. Klaassen had the one pass and that was it. Awful touches and give aawsys. I hope Traore shows more than he did today. Sanchez was good on the ball but didn't look like he knows how to defend. Still don't know what position Sinlgraven was playing.n

[souras84]

Haven't seen the match, but reading what you guys wrote I got the picture!

Our midfield is NON EXISTENT. The defenders always play the ball either between them or directly to the wingers. That makes our midfield useless. They are in the game just to run and cover the mistakes and the transition of the opposite team.

That's what makes us so predictable. Either you have 2 wingers like Ronaldo or Bale, that can take anyone on a one on one situation. Or you end up threatened by counterattacking teams, such as most of the small Eredivisie teams and smart European teams.

[Orange14]

Well it was nice to go to the movies this afternoon to get out of the stifling heat that we have here in the Washington DC area (38C this afternoon with bad humidity). At least we enjoyed the movie which is more than I can say for this Ajax match today. Did Frank de Boer make a surprise appearance back in the Arena? It sure seemed like it. We got a chance to see our new Colombian defender as well as our mercenary striker from Chelsea.

I forgot to see whether our Spanish language sports channel carried the Ajax match and they did which irritates me as I was constantly switching streams trying to find one that was reliable. The usual AceStream from Spain was delayed by 20 minutes and we had to leave the house before that one would have finished. The following comments and player ratings must only be taken as provisional. There was some weird stuff going on in the first half with Sinkgraven. Was he a winger? Was he a midfielder? Was this some kind of new offensive set up that Bosz conceived? I sure don't know the answer. Major praise for Dolberg which makes me wonder why we even are paying money for Traore. Zivkovic scored three goals in the Jong match yesterday, and both el Ghazi and Casseria can fill in at striker. Why didn't we look for a new left back to replace the disappointing Dijks. Still to early to figure out whether Sanchez is the real deal at defense. He's only been with the club for a couple of weeks so I'll cut him some slack. He looks to be very good with the ball. A great through pass to Klaassen in the 2nd half and lots of passes to surprised midfielders who never saw such passes last year. Of course he had a couple of bad positional plays.

My streams cut out on the tying goal so I cannot attribute any blame on that one. Dijks really screwed up on the first one. If this team is going to have trouble scoring goals then they will have to keep clean sheets and I don't know if they can do that at all.

The midfield continues to be a disaster and that's all I will say.

Bas Nijhuis did not have a good day with the match whistle. No way was that a foul on Tete just before the goal and on a replay I saw, Riedewald never committed a foul (though he did commit a dumb mental mistake by launching himself from 5 meters away)

Player ratings:

Cillessen (6.5) - made all the easy saves and punches that should be expected; not much he could do on the first goal
Dijks (3.5) - poor defense on the first goal and was poor on defense all match long
Riedewald (5) - some poor positional play
Sanchez (5) - really good passing but some bad mental mistakes that need to be cleaned up (he let one ball go to Cillessen when the Roda attacker had an equal chance to win the ball and slot a shot into an empty net)
Tete (6.5) - defended well and his ball handling in the offensive end was a delight to see
Gudelj (4) - time to move to Inter
Bazoer (5.5) - best of the midfielders and probably should have had more of the ball, I liked how quickly he passed the ball
el Capitan (5) - gets an average rating only because of the pass to Dolberg, otherwise he is dragging this team down; time to move on the Inter
Sinkgraven (5) - when he was a midfielder there was nobody other than Diks to draw Roda wide, when he was a winger he had a couple of good plays; was this all by design or just the player free lancing? Whatever it was it didn't work
Dolberg (7) - best player on the pitch, no more need be said
el Ghazi (4) - time to call his buddy CR7 for some remedial homework
Younes (5.5) - well at least we had a winger on the pitch
Traore (4.5) - gave a lot of thumbs up to team mates.

Home for the CL qualifier against Rostov this week before hosting Willem II next week. If this club has any designs on CL football they need a convincing clean sheet victory against the Russian club.

[Orange14]

We seem to have a MF problem. Three players who neither moved the ball quickly enough nor snuffed out counter attacks. Would like to see a MF of Riedewald, vd Beek and Klaassen.

As long as Klaassen is on the pitch the midfield will be dysfunctional. His ball skills are just appalling.

[Amol]

I don't know the reason why De Boer never tried or why Bosz has yet to try Bazoer at DM and Sinkgraven and Klaassen at AM.

Our best DM is Riedewald but he has to slot in at LB since we don't have a really good LB and also that he will take up one of the 3 MF spots.

We do need to get rid of Gudelj or move him to the bench at the very least.

[SPL]

This was the type of game Westermann should have appeared as sub for the last 10mins for Sanchez. Is he good enough as he looked very poor v PAOK the other week.

Sanchez will be a good defender but think he needs a few weeks at the club to get used to our style and indeed the players.