Ajax is a European football club based in Amsterdam, Netherlands. They are the most successful club in the Netherlands, with 36 Eredivisie titles and 20 Dutch Cups. They are also one of the most successful clubs in European-wide competitions, winning four Champions League titles. They are also one of the few teams to win the continental treble — when back in the 1971-72 season, they won the Eredivisie title, the Dutch Cup and the European Cup (the predecessor to the Champions League).
That is an impressive resume, but the talent Ajax has produced over the years is equally astonishing.
The Ajax Youth Academy has produced the likes of Johan Cruyff, Dennis Bergkamp, Clarence Seedorf, Wesley Sneijder and Matthijs de Ligt, to name a few.
The club is well known for giving chances on the senior team to young non-Dutch players who would later become titans of the sport, such as Zlatan Ibrahimović and Luis Suárez.
Ajax is the poster child for youth development and youth scouting abroad.
Why is it then that they had the worst opening to a season in club history this year, grabbing a meager five points from their first seven games?
The idea has been floated around that the club got too big for its britches. They have won four titles in the past decade and made a Champions League semi-final appearance in the 2018-19 season. The performance that season shined a spotlight on multiple key players in that squad, with multiple big names leaving for greener pastures. Player retention has been lacking ever since, with most players wandering into the spotlight and immediately being scooped up by bigger clubs with deeper pockets. So is life in the business of the sport.
Another issue we see is the crumbling of the club’s infrastructure. Marc Overmars was the longtime director of football at the club and resigned on Feb. 6 2022, after a scandal involving inappropriate messages he was sending to female colleagues. This is an unavoidable loss, but it is still a loss for the club.
By May 15, 2022, Erik ten Hag, the manager of the club, was gone after agreeing to manage Manchester United. Ten Hag had led the club to three Eredivisie titles, two Dutch Cups, and that aforementioned Champions League semi-final appearance. This was perceived as a huge loss at the time, but a review of his handling of Manchester United since he left Ajax shows that maybe his departure wasn’t so bad after all. I believe the loss is still felt at Ajax. The brand of football that Ten Hag employs may be hit or miss in England, but his Dutch track record shows it worked there.
The last piece of the puzzle is the club’s finances. After losing two of the biggest pieces of the club, there was a need for a spark. That spark was meant to be Steven Bergwijn. A Dutch forward who spent the first six years of his career playing in the Eredivisie and had shown streaks of excellence in England’s Premier League playing for Tottenham Hotspur — but was never consistent — seemed like a match made in heaven. A homecoming for a star youngster who had experience in one of Europe’s best leagues should have been the key to salvation.
The issue is that he cost the club €31.25 million (around $33.7 million), making him the most expensive transfer in Eredivisie history. That’s an outlandish price point, even for the perceived biggest club in the Netherlands.
It gets worse. On Aug. 8, Ajax made Bergwijn the new captain of the club, replacing Dušan Tadic, who was leaving for Turkish club Fenerbahçe. Tadic was a key component of the past five years of Ajax’s success. In his five years at the club, he finished his career in 12th place in all-time scoring. The man got things done.
Bergwijn is no Dušan Tadic. He has scored 18 goals and assisted seven so far in his Ajax career. Tadic, in his first two seasons, scored 39 and assisted 28. Unless Bergwijn intends to score 21 goals and assist 21 in the next 21 games, then I doubt he will live up to the captaincy and performance of Tadic.
Ajax currently sit 24 points behind league leaders PSV Eindhoven and are on their way out of the UEFA Europa League.
The club is in shambles compared to the last five years. I enjoy Ajax and appreciate the club’s history. I have been a Bergwijn fan for a number of years. Would I have broken the transfer record to bring him to Ajax? No.
Do I think there’s hope for the club? Yes.
The sensationalization of the loss is a bit out of hand, and I realize this article is adding to it, but I think that goes to show how grand of a club Ajax is. Three titles in five years was fantastic. The current state of the table surely means they won’t win the league. Their Europa League performance has sent them down to the Europa Conference League. They are still competing in the Dutch Cup competition.
The chance for glory still exists. Their history of success and recent dominance of their league have spoiled everyone who keeps an eye on them. The moment we see them falter, we run to the alarm and pull it. Ajax is suffering from success. Sure, it might not come this season, and if it does, it won’t be as plentiful as in the past, but who wants to win every year? Everyone! That’s the beauty of it all. Winning is only sweet when you have tasted the bitterness of losing.