Two goals and a mark of 8.90 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” ADO Den Haag have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Björn Menzo did not need any: 7.68, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
12 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ADO Den Haag this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
AZ asked and Feyenoord said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
13 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.76, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Player ratings1 Feb 2027
Yannick Eduardo, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.82
A mark of 7.82 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.99 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around ADO Den Haag they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 4 arrived, 1 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
11 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Hans Hateboer was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.24, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ADO Den Haag this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
10 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
The interest is real enough to have reached print. ADO Den Haag have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at ADO Den Haag training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matěj Šín is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Al Ahly have kept their man, and ADO Den Haag go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The fixture the rest of the division is looking forward to more than either of the sides in it. Both know a win changes the season and a defeat does not end it, which is what makes it hard to play.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Helmond Sport waiting with a shirt. Nobody at ADO Den Haag is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Player ratings11 Jan 2027
Yannick Eduardo, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.72
A mark of 7.72 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Everything agreed with Stade Rennais, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: AZ keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Evan Rottier has agreed terms with Vitesse for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what ADO Den Haag can pretend not to have heard.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and ADO Den Haag have had the benefit of it.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around ADO Den Haag they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. ADO Den Haag have done the hard part with FC Midtjylland, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
3 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.01, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; ADO Den Haag are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
20 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about ADO Den Haag and Jong Ajax in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Calvin Stengs and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
10 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
16 goals in 18 games at TOP Oss — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at AZ updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
14 goals in 18 games at ADO Den Haag — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at AZ updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Half the programme played, position 3, 36 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
“I watch every AZ game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Heerenveen runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Cambuur will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. ADO Den Haag were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.19, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ADO Den Haag this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matěj Šín was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
At 20 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Illaijh de Ruijter did not need any: 7.88, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Wolke Janssens and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Words at ADO Den Haag training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matěj Šín is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
A brace, and Mao Hosoya takes the afternoon — 8.54
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Mao Hosoya provided it, and the 8.54 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Calvin Stengs was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“I watch every AZ game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Heerenveen runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Kees Smit has come out of that comparison in the side, and AZ have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
9 goals in 15 games at ADO Den Haag — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at AZ updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Illaijh de Ruijter did not need any: 7.74, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Dylan Vente and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matěj Šín was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
There is a particular helplessness in conceding 2 times before the twentieth minute. Emmen tried to reorganise, ADO Den Haag did not allow it, and the result was written long before it was confirmed.
Marked 8.40 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Words at ADO Den Haag training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matěj Šín is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Matteo Waem was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Something was said to Dylan Vente and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Donát Bárány trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Evan Rottier has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether AZ can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Something was said to Mao Hosoya and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Kees Smit is on it.
7 goals in 11 games at Willem II — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at AZ updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Two goals and a mark of 8.75 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Wolke Janssens and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Matěj Šín falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Dylan Vente scored in the 85th minute, MVV Maastricht had already begun thinking about the journey home, and ADO Den Haag took the lot.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
A season average of 7.00 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. ADO Den Haag know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ADO Den Haag this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at ADO Den Haag training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matěj Šín is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
He is 23 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Two goals and a mark of 8.23 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 18 goals between ADO Den Haag and Jong PSV, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Matěj Šín wins it after the whistle should have gone
92 minutes played. Matěj Šín found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and RKC Waalwijk went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Illaijh de Ruijter did not need any: 7.81, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Dylan Vente and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Matěj Šín falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
He is 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; ADO Den Haag are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matěj Šín was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Matteo Waem and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Shots: 5. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
RKC Waalwijk next, and one man in the ADO Den Haag dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
The manager wanted a different profile for this opponent, which is a real football reason and no consolation. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
In brief
The dugoutMilan Hokke knocks on the manager’s door
Two goals and a mark of 8.49 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
A mark of 7.81 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Dylan Vente. 3‑1 against TOP Oss, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
He is 20 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 3‑1, Cody Clasie could afford to be generous.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
Roda next, and one man in the ADO Den Haag dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at ADO Den Haag has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at ADO Den Haag, and it is not being withdrawn.
Wolke Janssens and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at ADO Den Haag training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matěj Šín is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one ADO Den Haag will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at ADO Den Haag, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 7 signed and 5 gone
That is the business done at ADO Den Haag until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
ADO Den Haag asked and AZ said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $2.2M — a club that wants Hessel de Wit enough to be asked twice.
Wolke Janssens was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matěj Šín was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Somebody has moved past him. It is not a dropping and it is worse than one, because a dropping is about a Saturday and this is about where he stands.
Squad7 Sep 2026
10 new faces, and ADO Den Haag are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 88th, and Willem II spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at ADO Den Haag, and it is not being withdrawn.
$380.0K was the most the club would pay and Helmond Sport were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at ADO Den Haag training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matěj Šín is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Rosenborg have kept their man, and ADO Den Haag go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Yannick Eduardo has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Yannick Eduardo. 1‑0 against Willem II, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ADO Den Haag this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
ADO Den Haag offered $2.6M; Zwolle said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $2.8M — a club that wants Nick Fichtinger enough to be asked twice.
ADO Den Haag have gone to Helmond Sport with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Matěj Šín falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ADO Den Haag this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ADO Den Haag this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Matěj Šín falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and ADO Den Haag know it.
49 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.
ADO Den Haag have made the call to TSG Hoffenheim. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at ADO Den Haag has been clear about where Jarno Slootweg stands, which is more than many ever get.