Genius begins great works; labour alone finishes them. Twente 2012-2013 Season

Boschker at least gives a damn. Which is more than can be said about most in this team.

Looks like we're going to have a massive clean-out this summer and good riddance I say. Lots of youngsters brought in and brought back from loan spells. At least they've all got something to prove.

 

Wisgerhof and Breukers aren't in the starting XI. Castaignos did well in the second half of the season, he'll come good. Janssen at least works hard. It's not the quality of the players that's the problem. If you've got a core with Douglas, Tadic, Chadli and Fer, you have the quality to compete for top honours in the eredivisie. Every other team and that's including PSV and Ajax have weaknesses too.

Haven't you heard? Cabral's contract wasn't extended. He's been all over the local papers for causing trouble in the apartment building where he lives. This is a luxury high-rise in the Enschede city centre where Douglas and Fer also live. Let's just say their fellow residents aren't exactly happy about them living there. This also is why I'm so pissed off with these players. Douglas has taken up smoking and drinking, Cabral is behaving like an idiot, Mihaylov I've regularly spotted myself down town. They're just not taking their job seriously.

 

The club's football organisation is pretty much run exclusively by former players - I think Paddy Kluivert's the only one without a Twente history. Munsterman doesn't do anything football-related.

Douglas was fined and suspended earlier this season and he was even banned from the bench this past month. Cabral was also fined and Twente made him apologise to the people in the building. What more can you do to drive the message home? It's not like this club can't deal with difficult characters. The same people who are in charge now had the likes of Arnautovic and Elia behaving well, which is a considerable achievement.

 

Breukers only plays when Rosales is injured or suspended. Rosales just extended his contract and while he's not exactly a good defender, I'm happy about his extension. As an attacking right back, and those are hard to find, he's pretty good.

I agree with you about Janssen. He's not a top quality player but his workrate is second to none. I like his mentality.

We'll likely see a new team next season with half of the squad replaced and this is not a bad thing. I would like to see a new arse-kicking coach next season, someone with heaps of passion for this club. I'm hoping for Gert-Jan Verbeek. He grew up here in Enschede, he has heart for this club. His personality might clash with that of our chairman but never mind, as the Dutch saying goes it won't hurt for this club to get some pepper up its arse.

 

Just underscores what I've always thought really. In terms of individual quality, Twente is a lot better than Utrecht. This season's Twente was no team though. What a shame.

 

VI.nl haven't started their new transfer diary yet but I'm sure they will soon. I'll keep you updated.

 

Sonny Stevens was officially presented yesterday. He signed a five year contract.

So so far:

Definitely in: Kyle Ebecilio (midfielder, 19, on a free from Arsenal), Sonny 'Shakin' (erm..) Stevens (goalkeeper, 20, transfer fee Euro 350,000, from Dutch second division side Volendam)

Definitely back in: Quincy Promes (winger, 21, spent last season on loan at the Eagles where he stood out and became one of the best players in the second division)

Definitely out: Douglas (end of contract, no idea where he's going), Bajrami (spent last season on loan at A/S Monaco, no idea where he's going, we're likely to get a small transfer sum for him as he's got one year left on his contract), Marsman (was on loan at GA Eagles, not having his contract extended, will likely stay at the Eagles) Cabral (no contract extension, no idea where he's going) Braafheid (no contract extension offered to him, no idea where he' s going)

Probably out: Mihaylov (no idea where he's going, likely to fetch a reasonable transfer sum) Chadli (no idea where he's going, likely to fetch a big transfer sum)

Those who want to go: Brama (says he needs a new challenge) and Fer (has had his head up Everton's arse for the past six months)

Chairman has announced that we won't be spending big money even if we get a lot of cash for Chadli. Focus is on young Dutch players. No news yet re: new manager.

 

Twente has confirmed interest in signing Youness Mokhtar (21), winger at PEC Zwolle.

Young, talented, eager, cheap. It's all good.

 

Our scouts are pretty good at spotting talent for the wings, so hopefully they got this one right too.

 

We're also linked with Thievy Bifouma (UD Las Palmas) best known for scoring a hattrick vs Barcelona once.

Rumours about Bruma also persist.

 

You might have heard that we are likely to be without ex Feyenoord next season. Fer and Cabral are two of the least popular footballers ever to have set foot in Enschede. Who knew Castaignos would actually turn out to be the one with the best mentality out of that lot.

I have it on relatively good authority that Bruma himself is eager to come here.

 

Well thank you for that. Nice to hear after the truckloads of garbage we've had dumped on our club over the past six months!

Don't know if anyone's been aware of this but our chairman has been threatened over the FBK stadium thing. The FBK stadium is in Hengelo, right next to the Twente training centre. The stadium hosts an international athletics event every year. As only 2,000 paying spectators show up for it, it's operating at a heavy loss. So the city of Hengelo asked Twente if they wanted to buy the stadium. The idea being that we could then play our ladies team's CL games and our reserves (who will play in the second division next season, more on that later) there. Twente was willing to do this but as the stadium had to be altered, making football a priority and not athletics. Result: Dutch athletics community coming down hard on Twente and Munsterman, in the vilest way, over twitter and social media, and Munsterman got personal threats.

To sum this up: the city of Hengelo asked Twente for help, Twente said we'll see what we can do to help you out, at which a hate campaign vs Twente was rolled out, and against our chairman in particular. I saw even on the Dutch public news 'Twente threatens FBK games'. WTF????? I'm just telling this story to describe the tone of voice vs Twente here. A negative spin is given to every bit of news surrounding our club, even in the official news, and I won't even get into what's been said on the social media.

Anyway Twente has pulled out of this, leaving the city of Hengelo in shock. They now have an empty stadium without a single use and the whole FBK event will likely be sold to another city.

 

Napoli want Fer. Very good news. For us. Not sure if it's good news for Napoli.

 

The motto this summer is cheap, young and preferably Dutch (with plenty of statiegeld).

 

Several people spotted Roda striker Malki in the Enschede city centre this weekend. He could just have been enjoying a beer in the sun on our lovely old market square, of course, but it seems a bit of a long drive just for that.

I myself bumped into Fred Rutten. He wouldn't say anything about the rumour that he's going to return to the club (either as director of football or as coach).