Although the current season will still take a while, Ajax is largely already focused on the coming season. The Amsterdammers will want to take revenge for the disappointing performance in their own country. To achieve this, the selection will largely be overhauled. Ajax watcher Johan Inan expects that players such as Chuba Akpom, Carlos Forbs and Borna Sosa will no longer be able to be admired in the Johan Cruijff ArenA from next season.
When Sven Mislintat was appointed as the new technical director at Ajax last May, he knew he faced a tough challenge. The selection of the Amsterdam team had to be significantly renovated. The club said goodbye to a large number of important forces. It took a while for Mislintat to come up with the newcomers he wanted, but once he got the hang of it, he was unstoppable. Ajax paid a lot of money for players such as Josip Sutalo, Georges Mikautadze and Akpom.
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Mikautadze left Amsterdam on loan in January and it is expected that a large number of Mislintat signings will close the door of the Johan Cruijff ArenA behind them next summer. “It is already clear that the farewell tour has begun for the majority of the players recruited by Mislintat last summer,” Inan writes in Tuesday evening Algemeen Dagblad. “That does not apply to Diant Ramaj. In him, Ajax thinks they have a goalkeeper for years to come. A select group can still command a place, but things must be very strange if, for example, players like Akpom, Forbs, Benjamin Tahirovic, Sosa and Anton Gaaei are still active in the Johan Cruijff ArenA next season.”
According to Inan, Ajax is also betting on the departure of Jorge Sánchez and Owen Wijndal. The Mexican settled in Amsterdam in the summer of 2022, but was loaned to FC Porto after a disappointing year. Wijndal was never able to live up to the high expectations and is playing on a rental basis for Antwerp FC this season. “The plan is to sell them (the names mentioned above, ed.) as quickly as possible to generate money for purchases. Ajax expects that this will go more smoothly with the attractive Akpom and Forbs in England,” writes Inan. Ajax was able to say goodbye to the attackers acquired in the summer in the past transfer window. Both Akpom and Forbs were on the list of Nottingham Forest, but John van ‘t Schip did not want to let them go.
It will not be easy to get rid of all those players after this season. “Another obstacle for Alex Kroes: interested clubs know that Ajax, which will not qualify for the Champions League, can make good use of the money for bad purchases, which does not make the negotiating position much more favorable for the club,” it said. . Ajax will partly want to invest the money that Ajax generates from outgoing transfers in strengthening the player group. “Positions that require reinforcement are easy to guess with (wing) defenders and a right winger,” says Inan. “Kroes also sees that Ajax’s leader Jordan Henderson, who was appointed during the winter break, is not enough to raise the bar in everything.”
Which of the players recruited by Mislintat deserves another chance at Ajax?
2024-03-12 21:17:38
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