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Confirmed Signing Davy Klaassen

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davek said:
*I cant believe I'm having to remind someone of their own club's processes, but ok...*

Kids who first get into Ajax's youth set up start there when they're about 7 or 8 and will have been scouted in advance and then invited. They scout within a 50km zone from Amsterdam so Klaassen should have been well mopped up. He wasn't. He was transferred twice before reaching Ajax at 11 and would have been seen as one they missed out on and had to get in. Coaching is fluid at the club and coaching at different age groups isn't seen as more important with one group than with others. The coaches of each age group are all ex-club players and it's inconceivable that the head coach wouldn't hear about a player with talent that'd been brought in at that age. To believe that a head coach at Ajax would only become aware of talented youngsters when they burst into the older academy teams just beggars belief.

Koeman himself was bemoaning the fact that Ajax dont start their scouting as Feyenoord do at age 6, so it's a long shot that he, whilst at Ajax, wasn't looking closely at what was coming through the door at a much later age than that.
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What is the relevance in this?
That he didnt join AJAX at 6 but instead, 11?
 
Opens the door with a big smile on his face. Looks inside and quietly backs out in the hope that nobody has noticed.
 
Thomasc said:
lol

Can you believe somebody has to get involved in a topic, then gets so slated he has to then disappear for a while to read up on stuff so he can spout stuff off as fact?

Thank the lord of Wikipedia!
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Alan Partridge, 'I can gen up on any subject to university standard in an hour and then chair a radio phone in on it that informs and entertains. Wikipedia has made university education all but pointless.'
 

I haven't got a clue how good a player he is, but he has a class name, and the boss likes him, so I'm thinking it's good news until the booing starts......
 
Jacko93 said:
Forgive me if I'm wrong here Dave, but wasn't one of your many gripes with Koeman that he doesn't pay any attention to the kids?
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Difference between knowing who they are and playing them. In Holland it's a necessity to play younger players. My point with Koeman is that when not faced with that choice he'll buy in. He did that at Southamptin and the only player he's actually given massive game time to from the academy since being here is Davies.

I fully expect Kenny and Dowell to be loaned out this summer.
 
davek said:
Look mate, I dont doubt he has the required technique and vision that would have been part and parcel of his club's programme. My doubt is that he has only played in Eredivisie and that they may not transfer well. It will be much faster and more physical than in Holland and that has an unhappy knack of destroying the time required for vision and distribution.

Take it from me: what you see Klaassen being able to do week in week out over there is something that he will not be able to do over here. Can he adapt? Maybe. But €30M looks like a massive gamble to find out.

I would swerve the Dutch league and focus on La Liga, Bundesliga and Serie A imports. No offence, but your league is now a backwater. Sorry.
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Taking into account that any player could not live up to a price tag, who would you suggest we should look at with as much promise, experience and drive to get better for 30m euros?
 
BenscoAJAX said:
Klaassen wil adapt to the premier league, no doubt. Dont forget that besides playing in the eredivisi he has played matches on high levels like the Europe League and as an international as well. He knows the level of football required to perform well and he has the mentality to back it up.
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But there IS doubt. Massive doubt. The games in the latter stages of the EL this season I watched him in he was not a great leader and he didn't exactly stand out from the crowd.
 

Schwalbtino said:
*I can't believe someone who doesn't follow Ajax on a daily basis actually thinks he knows how things work at Ajax. Wikipedia scouting?*

The bold part:

This 'way of thinking' if you like is only there since the Cruijff-revolution in september 2010. This was, as you might know, long after Koeman was in charge at Ajax. The setup we have at Ajax now is only there since Cruijff came back in 2010 in an advisory role and was executed by head of youth development Wim Jonk (who himself is gone now). It is completely different than back in the Koeman day's. The youth setup back then was basically in a bit of a mess. There were still players coming through, but not of the standard we are used to at Ajax.

Of course when youth players move quickly to the ranks of the youth setup then the Head Coach will be made aware. But in a previous post you said:

"If you know anything about their set up you know that the whole structure is integrated, and for a player to be poached by the club at that age the head coach would know all about it."

This implies the Head Coach is actually involved in the process of snapping up youngsters at amateur clubs. This is simply false. The Head Coach has nothing to do with this. He would basically have to live at the club if he's also involved in stuff like this. I can't believe you actually think that.
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2010 my arse. The Ajax system has been in place for decades. Cruyff came in and basically did what Cruyff did everywhere: cause arguments about arcane, minor matters of policy in coaching and turn them into wars that he could rid himself of rivals he had a philosophical or personal hostility to.
 

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