Last Tuesday, Liverpool FC’s continued high pace of play led to the first loss (2-1) in the group stage of the Champions League, against AZ Ajax lost mainly on combativeness with the same figures. It was the first league defeat this season for the team of coach Alfred Schreuder, who had to give up the lead on goal difference to PSV. AZ follows, with seventeen out of seven, by one point. Feyenoord has sixteen points.
Unlike the match in Liverpool, Ajax did take the lead in Alkmaar. The goalscorer was again Mohammed Kudus. AZ came to 1-1 at the end of the first half, when Mees de Wit took advantage of a mistake by Ajax defender Devyne Rensch. Even before the break, in the sixth minute of extra playing time, Jens Odgaard AZ took the lead. In the second half, goalkeeper Remko Pasveer saved Ajax from a greater deficit, after which his teammates still missed a number of opportunities to equalize in the final phase.
Just like Liverpool FC, AZ put pressure early on, and again Ajax had a lot of trouble with the opponent’s playing style. Schreuder started with the same line-up as Tuesday, but this time decided to intervene in the break. Davy Klaassen came in for Kenneth Taylor. Later also Brian Brobbey (as extra striker for Rensch) and Lucas Ocampos and Lorenzo Lucca (as fresh attackers for Kudus and Steven Bergwijn), but there was no turnaround.
After the defeat, Schreuder noted that Ajax had the same problems in Alkmaar as in Liverpool. “We found too little free man in the first half,” he said. “I also thought AZ looked much fresher, they just did very well. But we must also learn from this. There was again enough space to play football. We only became dangerous when we started attacking more opportunistically in the last twenty minutes.”
Schreuder also commented on his players’ criticism of referee Bas Nijhuis, who in their view insufficiently punished some serious violations. “I just heard that in the dressing room, but I think we shouldn’t point to the referee after such a game.”
AZ coach Pascal Jansen admitted that he had looked closely at Liverpool’s game in preparation for this game. „You can see that Ajax can have a hard time if you fight them with such intensity. We deserved to win,” he said.
AZ is now the only unbeaten club in the Eredivisie. After the international match, Jansen hopes to have Vangelis Pavlidis and Jesper Karlsson available again. “I don’t know what that can say about the course of the rest of the competition,” said Jansen. “We’ll see in April or May. Ajax has lost many players, but also brought in many new players for a lot of money. And yet we were the better team. I am happy about that.” (NRC, ANP)
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper of September 19, 2022
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