69 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. ADO Den Haag lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. ADO Den Haag will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
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.
The words a physio says slowly. 77 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“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.
1 for Simon Graves, marked 7.77, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
The words a physio says slowly. 84 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Nigel Thomas trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Jong PSV in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at ADO Den Haag would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Matteo Waem signs something — a contract at ADO Den Haag or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The deal that would have taken Jonas Jensen-Abbew to Ajax has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to ADO Den Haag with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
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.
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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation ADO Den Haag are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
The dugout13 Sep 2027
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Memphis Klaassen, on a 2‑1 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Palermo is saying, and nobody at ADO Den Haag is enjoying the guessing.
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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at ADO Den Haag, and 0 appearances in 6 say he has earned the hearing.
In brief
The dugoutThe view from the dugout
Squad6 new faces, and ADO Den Haag are still learning each other
7.80, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
The board have signed the man in the dugout to a longer contract, which says more than any statement of support. Stability is easy to promise and costly to keep.
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.
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Position 9 on 64 points. Every season is a story and this is the last line of it, and now the club has three months to decide what the next one is about.
Player ratings17 May 2027
Othniël Raterink, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.26
A mark of 8.26 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.
“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.
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.
He is 21, 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.
At 23 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.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 11 combined actions and a mark of 7.59, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
In brief
SquadLuka Reischl falls out with a teammate over standards
The offer from KV Kortrijk for Jesse Bal was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
A mark of 7.82 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.
Successful dribbles: 20. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Helmond Sport have kept their man, and ADO Den Haag go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
The words a physio says slowly. 20 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
At 20 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
“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.
9 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
27 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. ADO Den Haag lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Two goals and a mark of 8.52 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Othniël Raterink is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Matteo Waem and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
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.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Memphis Klaassen could afford to be generous.
34 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. ADO Den Haag lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
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.
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 else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Memphis Klaassen was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the ADO Den Haag dressing room was either.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
“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.
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.
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 pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Nigel Thomas, and the manager let it.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Pascal Mulder's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
“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.
The hardest thing about being 19 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.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. ADO Den Haag have done the hard part with Volendam, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
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. PAOK have kept their man, and ADO Den Haag go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
He is 19 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.