[1567] Of revamping Ajax

Time off politics.

AFC Ajax is undergoing change.

Major change:

The board of AFC Ajax discussed the report with the club’s Members’ Council and members of honour on Tuesday evening. Much to everybody’s surprise, member of honour Johan Cruijff showed up at De Toekomst.

The outcome of the meeting was surprisingly spectacular: the club’s executive structure will be changed in accordance with the report. The board of AFC Ajax (chairman John Jaakke, board member of technical affairs Hennie Henrichs and board member of finance Joop Saan) will step down at the end of the current season.

The Members’ Council asked Johan Cruijff to effectively re-design the club’s technical policy and appoint people for the key positions. Much to everybody’s surprise, Cruijff said ‘yes’: 27 years after he returned to the club as a player, and 20 years after he left the club as a head-coach, Johan Cruijff will do official executive work for Ajax. He will not be the new chairman or technical director, but he will totally re-design the club’s technical structure on a ‘project basis’. In other words: Johan Cruijff will be the architect of the ‘new Ajax’.

The future of the current Board of Directors is highly uncertain. Remarkably, general director Maarten Fontein was not there when Uri Coronel presented his report. According to his lawyer, Fontein was “not invited” for the presentation. Chairman John Jaakke denied that Fontein will be fired, but on the same day football magazine Voetbal International published a draft for Fontein’s notice, which was ‘leaked’ by an unknown employee of the club.

Johan Cruijff can fire technical director Martin van Geel, but refused to comment on the positions of Fontein and Martin van Geel. “They’re not in my way,” he said. [Board to resign; Cruijff to re-design Ajax. Menno Pot. AjaxUSA. February 20 2008]

Finally, change in Amsterdam!

This is sorely needed. This season so far has been marked with missed opportunities and frustration, which is not too different previous recent seasons. Currently second and 9 points behind PSV, even the second spot is not guaranteed for Ajax as the season progresses slowly toward the end. Immediately below Ajax is NAC Breda, Feyenoord and Groningen. The only consolidation is that Ajax has done relatively better than Feyenoord. The bad news is that, other clubs outside of the traditional big three are threatening to break the monopoly.

Ajax certainly has the quality to perform in Europe but somehow or rather, the team has been terribly underperformed. This mocks the status of Ajax as one of the big clubs in Europe. Hopefully, this change is the first step toward a return to the glorious 1990s.