Ajax: Built, not Bought

  • Thread starter Thread starter Maximus94
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It's kinda funny that FM refuses to generate class LB's who are Dutch, until you realize that the last "great" pure LB was Arthur Numan. He was good, but of the Great Generation of 1998, he was the shittiest of the starting eleven.

Some might call Giovanni van Bronckhorst (my favourite player of all time), but he was a DM turned LB. Funny how FM honours this tradition.
 
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February 2016


Massive Upset!

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Results

Eredivisie
Ajax 2-2 Vitesse
(Veltman, Denswil o.g, de Jong, van Buren)

Eredivisie
FC Utrecht 0-2 Ajax
(Veltman, Fischer)

Eredivisie
Ajax 2-0 PSV
(Veltman, Fischer)

Eredivisie
Ajax 2-0 Heracles
(Sigborsson x2)

Champions League Round of 16
Ajax 3-1 Manchester United
(Andersen x2, van Persie, Fischer)

Eredivisie
AZ 1-1 Ajax
(Johannsson, de Jong)

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Player of the Month

Lucas Andersen
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Whilst Fischer has been on a scoring spree this month, I can't go past the man who troubled Manchester United for 90 minutes. The boy was unplayable at times, tearing through their defensive line and embarrassing players with his dribbling. He held his nerve with a late penalty after he was in the right place after a goal-box scrap early in the match!

Impressively, we chose to stick to our regular strategy of keeping the ball and moving it around quickly despite being the weaker team against United. It really paid off! We had 60% of the possession and over double the amount of shots on target. van Persie did manage to bring it back to 2-1 on the break, but Andersen's 92nd minute penalty gives us a 2 narrow goal lead in the 2nd leg. No doubt they'll be coming out firing in front of their own fans, we'll need to make sure our defensive is prepared.

We also managed to win the top of the table clash against PSV, which now gives us some breathing room at the top.​
 
Been following since the start! Loving this save! Enjoyed reading it so much I created my own Ajax save and trying to reach the same goals; having a full team of homegrown Dutch players and trying to win the Champions league with said players.
It has been a quite interesting compassion, in who we have both decided on selling and playing.

-> For me, Lasse Schone had to go straight away. Sold him for 6mil. Played Blind and Siem De Jong in the middle (4-4-2).

***Viktor Fischer is playing as a poacher, netted 18goals and 14 assists in 23 games. Sigborsson as a target man, 24goals and 6assists in 30games. These two are monsters up front!

Anyway, wont take up anymore of your thread with my save :p Just know, that you have helped me find a save that I haven't got bored after the first season.
Cheers for that! I will continue to follow and use this thread as a guide of sorts! :)
 
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Disclaimer89 said:
Been following since the start! Loving this save! Enjoyed reading it so much I created my own Ajax save and trying to reach the same goals; having a full team of homegrown Dutch players and trying to win the Champions league with said players.
It has been a quite interesting compassion, in who we have both decided on selling and playing.

-> For me, Lasse Schone had to go straight away. Sold him for 6mil. Played Blind and Siem De Jong in the middle (4-4-2).

***Viktor Fisher is playing as a poacher, netted 18goals and 14 assists in 23 games. Sigborsson as a target man, 24goals and 6assists in 30games. These two are monsters up front!

Anyway, wont take up anymore of your thread with my save :p Just know, that you have helped me find a save that I haven't got bored after the first season.
Cheers for that! I will continue to follow and use this thread as a guide of sorts! :)
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Thanks a lot for the kind words, always appreciated! Great to hear I have some long term readers! I'm happy I inspired you too! I always find investing in youth, or growing a squad so much more rewarding in FM and makes me keep going on instead of making a new save every few days. I never thought of playing Fischer up front but it appears he's doing really, really well for you.

I'll be posting my tactic soon.
 
Maximus94 said:
Thanks a lot for the kind words, always appreciated! Great to hear I have some long term readers! I'm happy I inspired you too! I always find investing in youth, or growing a squad so much more rewarding in FM and makes me keep going on instead of making a new save every few days. I never thought of playing Fischer up front but it appears he's doing really, really well for you.

I'll be posting my tactic soon.
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I definitely agree. I usually start every year with spurs, win the lague and other cups then go out buying ALL the best regens. It starts to get boring after awhile. This year I got bored with spurs after 3 seasons, also just fed up and bored with the game....until I started the Ajax save, finding it far more interesting/exciting when playing with certain rules..

-Only allowing myself to buy DUTCH youth players.
-Not allowed to buy any players between 20-30.
-Only non dutch players I can buy are 30+ years old, on free transfers (mainly used to have a few veterans for tutoring. I picked up Gallas 1st season and Ronaldinho 2nd season for example).

I find this keeps things fresh!

Yeah Viktor has been great! Has all the key stats to be a major success as a poacher! Although PSG and Chelsea have started sniffing around :/

Looking forward to the tactic.
 
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March 2016


Unbelievable Month!

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Results

Eredivisie
ADO Den Haag 0-2 Ajax
(Denswil, Ebecilio)

Eredivisie
Ajax 1-0 VVV
(de Jong)

Eredivisie
sc Heerenveen 2-4 Ajax
(Ebecilio, van Dam, Sigborsson, van Lingen, Wildschut, Sahar)

UEFA Champions League Round of 16
Manchester United 0-0 Ajax

Eredivisie
NEC 0-1 Ajax
(Fischer)

UEFA Champions League Quarter Final
Ajax 1-0 Juventus
(Andersen)

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Player of the Month

Stefano Denswil
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Stefano remain our rock at the back along with Veltman. Their partnership ensuring not a single goal was conceded in any match they featured in over March.

As expected United threw everything they had at us in the return leg, but our hard work on keeping our shape on the training ground worked a treat as we saw chance after chance wasted by United after they grew frustrated. Our nail-bitingly narrow draw ensured we'd progress for the first time in 13 years to the quarter finals where we'd face Juventus.

The Juventus game was a very tight affair. They preformed far better than United did on our turf. Ultimately, it was their lack of pace up front that prevented all their counter attacks penetrating our high line. The penalty from Andersen gives us an uncomfortable one goal advantage going to Italy.​
 
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April 2016


League Champions, but the Season Continues

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Draws

UEFA Champions League Semi-Final

Chelsea vs Ajax


Results

Eredivisie
Ajax 4-2 Feyenoord
(Geraldo, Sigborsson, Vormer, Denswil x2, Andersen)

UEFA Champions League Quarter Final
Juventus 1-0 p Ajax
(Rondon)

Eredivisie
Ajax 2-1 RKC
(Kishna, Pluim, Ebecilio)

Eredivisie
FC Den Bosch 1-3 Ajax
(Sigborsson, Riedewald, Dijksteel, Kilic)

Eredivisie
Zwolle 2-0 Ajax
(Klich, Alfaro)

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Player of the Month

Stefano Denswil
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Yet again, our most outstanding player.


The Juventus game was a real nail-biter. Both teams missed chance after chance, and only a brilliant Rondon solo effort on the break separated the teams after 210 minutes of play. The game went to penalties. Both team put their first 4 away without trouble, then Vermeer saved Fernando Lorente's effort. Serero stepped up to the mark, placed the ball, and shot at the left stick. Their GK touched it onto the post, 42,000 spectators fell silent, before the ball trickled over the line.

The draw sees us going to London first to face newly crowned Premier League winners Chelsea, which sees me go up against Mourinho for the 1st time since our last spat when I was in charge of Barcelona. I'm itching to whip the smug grin off his face this time around!​
 
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Hey bud. Glad to see that everything is still coming together. I've just started my third season and have just sold Van Rijn and Van Der Hoorn. Got 7.5 million for Van der Hoorn so couldn't say no. Ended up flogging a load more so went off piste a little bit and signed Mitrovic. Kind of fits the philosophy. Got a couple of quality regens come through so had to make room. Keep it up.
 
Just caught up with this. Still going really well.

Great results vs United and Juve, how are they doing on your save in their leagues now?

Keep it up :)
 
Serero is quality out on the right wing! Scores for fun! Just finished my second season and he scored 12goals and 14assists in 21 games!
 
Average Joe said:
Just caught up with this. Still going really well.

Great results vs United and Juve, how are they doing on your save in their leagues now?

Keep it up :)
Click to expand...

Juventus just finished 2nd after winning the previous 2 years, and United is the exact same.
 
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May 2016


Fairy-tail Ends at the Final Hurdle

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Results

UEFA Champions League Semi-Final
Chelsea 1-3 Ajax
(Willian, Fischer, Andersen, Denswil)

UEFA Champions League Semi-Final
Ajax 2-2 Chelsea
(Hazard x2, de Jong, Serero)

In both games our goals were seriously against the run of play. We made our chances from set pieces count as our 3 first leg goals all came directly from free-kicks. In the 2nd game, after Hazard scored his 2nd I made an early tactical change and decided to push higher up in order to push their midfield back. It worked as we won the game from that moment, scoring off a cross and a brilliant pass from de Jong for Serero to go 1v1 and put his chance away.

UEFA Champions League Final
PSG 2-0 Ajax
(Cavani x2)

The scoreline doesn't show how well we played. We held the game to 0-0 going into the final third of the match before a brilliant cross pinpointed Cavani's forehead. Late in the match, a poor long shot was fired towards our goal, it took a massive deflection off Cavani who knew nothing about it, and we were 2 behind with minutes to go.


Player of the Month

Lucas Andersen
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Player of the Season

Stefano Denswil
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Young Player of the Season

Jurgen van de Kerkhof
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Youth Player of the Season

Juan Andrea
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Award Winners

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Other Continental Winner

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Maximus94 said:
Can't do that mate, it wouldn't be realistic. Ajax have a duty in supplying the national team with class players, and really only sign youngsters from Scandinavia and Belgium.

Even neighbouring country, Germany, is a stretch.
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Not true. They bring in anyone!! Steven Pienaar isn't Dutch, Cuenca isn't Dutch....
 
Redbullsnation said:
Not true. They bring in anyone!! Steven Pienaar isn't Dutch, Cuenca isn't Dutch....
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Point taken. However, South Africans' are more common signing because a national language is Dutch, and they're strongly affiliated with Ajax CT. Cuenca is explained by the connection between Ajax and Barcelona.

I don't want my squad full of Brazilians, Frenchmen, Englishmen ect. I don't find it realistic. As I've said before. Another of my goals is to have only Dutch players throughout the entire club.
 
Maximus94 said:
Point taken. However, South Africans' are more common signing because a national language is Dutch, and they're strongly affiliated with Ajax CT. Cuenca is explained by the connection between Ajax and Barcelona.

I don't want my squad full of Brazilians, Frenchmen, Englishmen ect. I don't find it realistic. As I've said before. Another of my goals is to have only Dutch players throughout the entire club.
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Technically speaking, any south american players brought in would have a Dutch passport when they make it to the first team....and South Africans speak ENGLISH :D
 
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Done brilliant to get to the final. Really good signs for the future mate
 
Losing the final is a shame, but it's still a brilliant accomplishment. You're far from running dry on talent at Ajax. Next season?
 
Kwarkzak said:
Losing the final is a shame, but it's still a brilliant accomplishment. You're far from running dry on talent at Ajax. Next season?
Click to expand...

I'm really surprised we managed to make the final. I set a personal goal of making past the round of 16, but the final was never in the picture.

I'm not sure we have the squad yet to push for constant success the likes of what we had this season. (I'll be trying to push out the final few "non-homegrown-at-club-players this season which could lead to a slightly weaker squad, and less depth). But, I'd say in 3 years we'll be very tough to look past.
 
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Update



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Rijkaard: A Tactical Genius

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Journalist: "Frank has been kind enough to provide us with a basis for the tactics he has used over the brilliant past 3 seasons in charge of Ajax:"

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Rijkaard: "I never play with this 2nd tactic. I only use it to make fine tweaks of the 1st one. Things like, lowing the tempo when we're ahead, and swapping the pivot for an advanced midfielder when we're behind. You get the idea."

Jounalist: "Where does your inspiration for this tactical style of play come from?"

Rijkaard: "Mainly from my Barcelona successor Pep Guardiola. I like to conserve the ball as much as possible, but also to hurt opponents with it. Liverpool's 2013-2015 team I feel also closely resembles our style, mainly in the quick tempo, moving the ball around fast to get the opponents our of position. What's your next question?"


(This is where I'd like you guys to ask if there's anything else you'd like to know. Using a bit of role playing, ask your questions not in the form of yourselves, but in the form of the interviewer above. Please use the same formatting to make it seamless...fingers crossed)​
 
Jounalist: Who do you believe will be your star player in years to come?

&

Jounalist: Do you worry that you will end up losing many of your best players the more their reputations grow?
 
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