Search: 'Johan Cruyff'

The two men most closely associated with Ajax’s major successes are at the centre of yet another power struggle, reports Derek Brookman

When the Ajax supervisory board announced on November 16 that Louis van Gaal was to be appointed as director, the news came as a shock. Van Gaal left his position as the club’s technical director in 2004 after a disagreement, saying he had been deeply insulted and would never return.

Read more…

Adam Bushby and Rob MacDonald discuss Manchester City’s proposed new youth facility

Manchester City’s application for a new youth academy and training facility, covering 80 acres and set to cost £100 million, will be considered by the city council on December 22. It is perhaps the most audacious of the various methods by which clubs have sought to emulate Barcelona’s La Masia academy. While the latter has evolved – it moved to a new location on June 30 as Masia-Centre de Formació Oriol Tort – and facilities all over the world have been refurbished and updated piecemeal, City are the only club attempting to drop an entire state-of-the-art complex on top of an already successful academy.

Read more…

Derek Brookman discusses the possibility that Ajax’s recent mediocrity may not just be a passing phase

When Martin Jol’s Ajax embarked on a magnificent late-season run in the spring, winning their last 13 league matches in a row while scoring 47 times in the process, it seemed like – for the club’s supporters at least – the natural order was being restored.

Read more…

There was little sympathy for the losing finalists in South Africa. Derek Brookman laments an effective but aggressive approach

Holland’s first World Cup final for 32 years left a lasting impression, but unfortunately not for the right reasons. Johan Cruyff described his compatriots’ football as “ugly and vulgar”. In Spain, El País talked of “an unrecognisable Holland” and “intimidating behaviour”, while France’s Le Figaro said it “had all the characteristics of anti-football and was of unprecedented brutality”.

Read more…

A promising career undone by lifestyle choices. Graham Willgoss tells the tale of a good-looking footballer who made quite an impression on Harry Redknapp

Portugal has produced its fair share of gifted footballers who have embraced style over substance. None, however, has done so more openly than Dani da Cruz Carvalho, the twinkle-toed attacking midfielder-cum-striker known simply as “Dani”, who spent nine games at West Ham on loan from Sporting Lisbon in the late winter of 1996.

Read more…