Dutch Football

I was just watching a replay of the Ajax vs PSV game which Ajax won 4-1.

It was painful to see how average both the sides were.

Will dutch football ever get back to the standards it had during early 90's?

Even the youth talent coming from ajax, psv and feyenord have dried up.

I used to enjoy watching ajax and psv. Football played in the right way. Still remember how PSV gave a run around to milan and very unlucky to be knocked out (Park was man of the match in both legs!!)

I don't think it will happen now.

Dutch football was the worst affected league by champions league.

Anyone else miss the good ajax and psv teams in champions league?
Unfortunate imo and hopefully they will be back very soon like we are seeing with the french teams.

I do, I hate the fact that 2 or 3 leagues dominate the CL and European competition. It's one of the reasons I don't give a £#%&! about the CL.

Originally Posted by rafabio

I was just watching a replay of the Ajax vs PSV game which Ajax won 4-1.

It was painful to see how average both the sides were.

Will dutch football ever get back to the standards it had during early 90's?

Even the youth talent coming from ajax, psv and feyenord have dried up.

I used to enjoy watching ajax and psv. Football played in the right way. Still remember how PSV gave a run around to milan and very unlucky to be knocked out (Park was man of the match in both legs!!)

I don't think it will happen now.

Dutch football was the worst affected league by champions league.

Anyone else miss the good ajax and psv teams in champions league?
Unfortunate imo and hopefully they will be back very soon like we are seeing with the french teams.

Yes, they should be back to those standards by mid-April at the latest.

HTH.

Originally Posted by dunk

I do, I hate the fact that 2 or 3 leagues dominate the CL and European competition. It's one of the reasons I don't give a £#%&! about the CL.

I think you can safely say 2 leagues now. I don't think for sometime we will see a winner other than spanish or english team.

It will be even more harder once real assemble a good expensive defence this summer

Lyon will soon get plundered again. I can't see the likes of cissokho or pjanic staying there for too long.

porto and other portugese teams are shit.

Ribery is already talking about moving clubs despite bayern being in quarter finals, can't see robben staying there too long if he plays well and stays injury free.

Then we will be back to square one - barca, real, united, chelsea, arsenal and city (:eek), maybe if mourinho stays inter will be in with a shout.

It's shit.

Used to be there were 10-15 teams all with a good collection of players and one or two 'stars' that could hurt anyone. They weren't all necessarily in with a shout of winning it, but no-one wanted to play them. The teams were scattered all over Europe as well.

It used to be exciting to see who we were drawn against, just because players you had heard of but seen little were coming to town and you had no idea what to expect. Now, all but 3 or 4 teams are pretty much nailed on as run of the mill victories, to the point where a Wednesday night game against AC Milan is akin to a PL game against Wolves or £#%&!ing Pompey.

The @#%&!s have destroyed football.

agreed its pretty shit now, i used to love dutch football tbh.

shteve mclarens doing a good job at twente.

Originally Posted by dunk

It's shit.

Used to be there were 10-15 teams all with a good collection of players and one or two 'stars' that could hurt anyone. They weren't all necessarily in with a shout of winning it, but no-one wanted to play them. The teams were scattered all over Europe as well.

It used to be exciting to see who we were drawn against, just because players you had heard of but seen little were coming to town and you had no idea what to expect. Now, all but 3 or 4 teams are pretty much nailed on as run of the mill victories, to the point where a Wednesday night game against AC Milan is akin to a PL game against Wolves or £#%&!ing Pompey.

The @#%&!s have destroyed football.

I don't think any club bar spanish and english one have stars at all!!

Milan have a barcelona reject in terms of ronaldinho and only got pato since not too many noticed him (or due to work permit problems)

inter are made up by barcelona and real madrid rejects. (although I would love to have sneijder)

The only 'star' outside english and spanish teams is Ribery at bayern but I guess he will be soon at chelsea.

Seriously UEFA needs to give it a thought or else we will have around 4-6 teams who can win the trophy year in year out and same 4 semi finalists.

Even the likes of 'stars in waiting' the next big things that are still at their 'nursery' club, there just aren't any. There are so few players who are obviously going to push on and be one of the stars of their generation, the World over, it's not funny.

Remember the days of Sonny Anderson, Giovanni Elber, Amoroso, Batistuta to name but a few, all plying their trade it different leagues, France, Spain, Germany, Italy over the course of their career, all able to cause any team a headache and the occasional shock.

European football is shit now. The watering down of the CL, making it easier to get into has actually rid clubs of ambition, clubs who longed to win the league and spent every summer plotting on improving squads and clubs to do just that, now aim for 3rd/4th and making as much money as possible.

Originally Posted by dunk

I do, I hate the fact that 2 or 3 leagues dominate the CL and European competition. It's one of the reasons I don't give a £#%&! about the CL.

been saying the same thing for years. worse, the cl rewards teams that have non-competitive leagues with only a couple of clubs challenging for the title (england and spain in recent years) and penalises those with healthy competition (germany). the cl really is an absolute horror show in terms of the health of the game.

Originally Posted by borsuk

been saying the same thing for years. worse, the cl rewards teams that have non-competitive leagues with only a couple of clubs challenging for the title (england and spain in recent years) and penalises those with healthy competition (germany). the cl really is an absolute horror show in terms of the health of the game.

dutch football is worse hit than germany imo purely because of the size of it as a nation. Germany can still withstand the pressure since they will always have the backing of large group of loyal supporters. for teams like ajax, psv it is asking too much imo.

In fact I am surprised that their supporters still have ambition left in them because of seeing their stars being plundered year on year by clubs in spain, england and italy.

But unfortunately champions league can't be stopped because of the teams involved in it. no-one involved in it want to let it go, even the likes of bayern and lyon, because it helps them in their domestic competitions.

I agree with all that has been said in this thread. The Milan game last week was weird, it had the feel of a regular league game or something. I know the result over there put us in a great position, but still, we were playing Milan with the chance of getting to the next round of the European Cup and it just didn't feel like that, it's become the norm for the clubs in rich leagues to piss it tbh. As me and Dunk agreed on before the Milan game, it doesn't get good until the semi-final now tbh. That's when it has the real 'European' feel to it, the real knock out, high intensity atmosphere etc.

Growing up I loved watching Italian football on Channel 4 etc. In the late 90's when I was 12-13 I use to tape the late Sunday Italian football show on Channel 4 and watch it after school on Monday, and then when they also had live games on a Sunday I'd watch them. Now when you watch the Italian League it's £#%&!ing £#%&!. I love reading about past Ajax teams and love how they produced top players and always taught their players how to play top class football. Like you say, look at the state of Ajax and PSV now.

I could certainly see a 'European Super League' type thing happening, maybe not clubs leaving their domestic leagues, but creating a different type of European competition to play in as well as their leagues, and that will make European football feel even more 'normal' and samey.

I watched the entire match and bar suarez I didn't think ajax had a single player who is capable of playing for a top club.

even as near as 2002-03, they had ibramovich, sneijder, de jong, pienaar, heitinga, van der vaart etc players and used to love watching them.

Originally Posted by rafabio

I watched the entire match and bar suarez I didn't think ajax had a single player who is capable of playing for a top club.

even as near as 2002-03, they had ibramovich, sneijder, de jong, pienaar, heitinga, van der vaart etc players and used to love watching them.

I did a few games with them on Champ 01/02 and they had a pretty good side then.

Originally Posted by rafabio

dutch football is worse hit than germany imo purely because of the size of it as a nation. Germany can still withstand the pressure since they will always have the backing of large group of loyal supporters. for teams like ajax, psv it is asking too much imo.

There are problems in Dutch football, but support certainly isn't one of them.

A number of clubs are expanding their grounds, and crowds are the highest they've ever been & staying strong. Ajax's great side of the 70s was when they played at De Meer, rarely getting above 20k.

I can't find it, but I remember reading an article a while ago criticising Ajax's youth system in recent years. Cruyff was due to go back and become technical director and see a change in the way things were run, but he fell out with Van Basten and it never went through.

Platini and Uefa are trying to do something about this, but all they get in response is abuse and accusations that they're trying to end the English progression/dominance in European competition.

Still, Bordeaux have been a refreshing suprise in this year's Champions League. In fact, it's been a very good year for the French league across European competition. Bordeaux the quickest qualifiers in the CL and Lyon knocking out Real, and Lille beating Liverpool and Marseille looking good in their tie with Benfica in the Europa League.

Originally Posted by MrBishi

There are problems in Dutch football, but support certainly isn't one of them.

A number of clubs are expanding their grounds, and crowds are the highest they've ever been & staying strong. Ajax's great side of the 70s was when they played at De Meer, rarely getting above 20k.

I can't find it, but I remember reading an article a while ago criticising Ajax's youth system in recent years. Cruyff was due to go back and become technical director and see a change in the way things were run, but he fell out with Van Basten and it never went through.

I was not exactly referring to the empty seats but more about how long will these clubs keep the support going. But i wasn't aware that crowds are increasing!! It will be good to see dutch football back to the best.

Side Red, what you are saying is true about bordeaux. Even PSG are getting their shit together. But I suspect bordeaux are more like monaco of 2004 season. I want to see them competetive for 2-3 seasons.

Hell of a league in France this year, too. Marseille are in 6th place, but they're only three points off the top. Apparently the football has been good over there this year, also, which makes a change.

Originally Posted by rafabio

I watched the entire match and bar suarez I didn't think ajax had a single player who is capable of playing for a top club.

even as near as 2002-03, they had ibramovich, sneijder, de jong, pienaar, heitinga, van der vaart etc players and used to love watching them.

heitinga and pienaar are at £#%&!ing everton, de jong at city, sneijder and vdv have flopped at big clubs

Even the likes of 'stars in waiting' the next big things that are still at their 'nursery' club, there just aren't any. There are so few players who are obviously going to push on and be one of the stars of their generation, the World over, it's not funny.

Remember the days of Sonny Anderson, Giovanni Elber, Amoroso, Batistuta to name but a few, all plying their trade it different leagues, France, Spain, Germany, Italy over the course of their career, all able to cause any team a headache and the occasional shock.

very few players are the stars of any generation by definition.

and crying out for the days of sonny anderson and elber.... how good were they really?

there are some good points in this thread but so much nostalgia as well, we'll probably look back fondly at the likes of bordeaux and cska moscow from this years competition in a few years time.

Originally Posted by fix up look SHARPE

sneijder and vdv have flopped at big clubs

that's %@#$&!s. sneijder was excellent at madrid and was sold to make space for the new galacticos, not because he flopped.


the point about stars is an irrelevance anyway. we know rafa%@#$&!s only watches football to £#%&! over stars but the real point is that clubs from a wider range of leagues were able to compete at the top not so long ago, including the dutch clubs.

I didn't say they were world class, 'fix up look no sharpe'.

they were good players at that time, ajax had a really good team.

You can say very rarely that about any team outside spain and england nowadays