Football Season Guide

Ajax come from a triumphant season with a second consecutive double by winning their 35th national title and 20th KNVB Beker. No surprise, as they were the favorites, but the impressive thing was the ease with which they won; 28 wins from 34 matches, 102 goals scored, and only 23 goals conceded. Perhaps this extreme ease at home betrayed them when it came to playing the European cups. They did not make it out of the Champions League group stage and in Europa League too things did not go particularly well as in the quarter-finals they lost to Roma. It must be said that their strongest attacking player Sebastien Haller couldn’t be deployed in Europa League due to a clumsy administration mishap. Moreover, since February they had to do without their regular goalkeeper Andrè Onana who was suspended by UEFA for one year for violating doping rules. That means he will miss more than 5 months of the coming season and again 38 y.o. Stekelenburg will be in goal. Behind him there will be no more Kjell Scherpen, who moved to Brighton, but young Jay Gorter coming from Go Ahead Eagles, and experienced Remko Pasveer taken from Vitesse. So far, during the transfer campaign Ajax have managed to keep all their best players, even if there are rumours that a few of them (Antony, Neres, Alvarez) could leave before the transfer window closes. The biggest arrival in Amsterdam is Dutch international Steven Berghuis who did very well with PSV Eindhoven past season (21 goals and 16 assists in 41 games). For the rest, as usual, the club will allow some new and young talent to emerge. So far they played 5 friendly games (3W and 2D), the most important ones were against Anderlecht (Ajax won 2-0) and Bayern Munich (2-2).