Marked for Mark Engel
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market8 May 2028
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.
Squad8 May 2028
A falling-out at Ajax
Sofyan Amrabat and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Loan watch8 May 2028
30 appearances away from home and 10 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.
The dugout8 May 2028
Gabri Veiga has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Ajax will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Squad8 May 2028
Gabri Veiga named in the team of the month
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Gabri Veiga is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Squad8 May 2028
A row about effort at Ajax
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kyan Vaesen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Loan watch8 May 2028
37 starts and an average of 6.77. He went there to play and he is playing, which is the only thing a loan was ever for.
The dugout8 May 2028
Mark Engel gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout8 May 2028
Sam Cuntapay is still paying for one afternoon at Ajax
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match12 Feb 2028
Still nobody has beaten Ajax
The unbeaten run reaches 27. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Match8 Feb 2028
Ajax through in the cup
A 5‑2 win over Emmen, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Player ratings14 Feb 2028
A brace, and Kyan Vaesen takes the afternoon — 8.52
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Kyan Vaesen provided it, and the 8.52 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Transfer targets14 Feb 2028
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Match12 Feb 2028
Ajax make home a hard place to visit
14 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.
Player ratings14 Feb 2028
Nafairon Landvreugd, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.44
A mark of 8.44 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Patrick Berg in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ajax this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Defences have started doubling up on Sondre Ørjasæter
8 goals and a season average of 7.56 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Match8 Feb 2028
7 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Ajax and Emmen in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match4 Dec 2027
Nobody wants to play Ajax right now
12 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.
Match4 Dec 2027
4‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Player ratings6 Dec 2027
Two goals and a mark of 9.33 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Match6 Dec 2027
Nobody above Ajax
First, on 38 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.
The dugout6 Dec 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Ajax may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market6 Dec 2027
“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.
Squad6 Dec 2027
A falling-out at Ajax
Patrick Berg and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match4 Dec 2027
Nobody wins at Ajax
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Player ratings6 Dec 2027
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.41, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market30 Aug 2027
Ajax spend $5.6M to raise the standard
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $5.6M has been paid because Kyan Vaesen is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
Market30 Aug 2027
“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 Ajax, and it is not being withdrawn.
Transfer targets30 Aug 2027
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. PSV have kept their man, and Ajax go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Kyan Vaesen gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Kyan Vaesen has just signed for Ajax, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Tempers go at Ajax
Patrick Berg 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.
Market30 Aug 2027
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.
Squad30 Aug 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Emre Ünüvar and Ajax agree another 5 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Too much change too quickly at Ajax
9 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
Loan watch30 Aug 2027
“I did not go to Barnsley to sit and watch. I want to come back to Ajax and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.