It depends on where de Vrij plays. IMO he is the best central defender at this point in time. Veltman is superior to Bruma of course and a little more experienced than van Beek. If we are looking out at the WC which is three years from now, I'm not sure Veltman is a starter if van Beek continues to progress.
@Frysk Bloed Alright, since this is the Ajax thread, I will keep it short and move on. I am not sold on the idea of Veltman progressing so much and I am not sure his height and overall posture is enough for the international scene. Regarding the stats, one defensive error is not the same to the other. We still have to check the severity of each error. In this regard, Veltman has left an impression on me. Yes, he is a footballing defender, but did he generate better football after the red card, carrying his team to a higher circulation tempo? However Orange14 sees him every game, not me and he deems him consistent. So this might be a case of watching the wrong games of him over the past seasons and this game doing something stupid. In principle, I like a player like Veltman (the footballing kind). However at what point does such a player also carry the responsibility that circulation is so slow at the back? That is football as well.
I think this is a pretty fair statement. I have Beek also seen make plenty mistakes. I remember a game with U21 against Portugal where he was awful. These are different times. In the past we clear outliers, like de Boer and Stam. Now there is a whole group, not being so far of each other. That is why these debates pop up I guess. Anyway, let's move on. This is the Ajax thread.
I'll close this discussion out by also noting that Ajax football tactics are just bad and I think this has a lot to do with how Veltman is perceived. Yes, Ajax do have lots of possession every game but most of it is outside the attacking third of the pitch. As I noted in my player comments yesterday, Cillessen is the recipient of so many back passes. Now maybe this is because the Ajax midfield is not very good or that FdB just is ultra-conservative or maybe a mixture of the two. This style of play has been going on ever since Eriksen and Vertonghen both left the club. Veltman is one of the few players on the squad who does look up field and try to make a positive pass more often than a negative pass. I think he does have a good football sense. Too bad he doesn't possess more quickness as he might be an ideal holding midfielder.
I rate De Vrij a bit higher than Veltman at the moment. I also don't think Veltman has much potential to grow much more as a player. But who knows. Speaking of positive passing from CB. Jairo has got it. I was talking about the same goal btw, just to clarify.
For those who love football, here you can watch Ajax vs Barcelona in 1993. Those were the early days of players who conformed the soul of Dutch soccer in the 90's. At the other side, Barca and its first 'dream team' with Koeman, Laudrup, Stoichkov and Romario. Enjoy!
Sinkgraven having a horrible day on defense and two goals conceded that never should have been. This team is really quite poor.
I came home, put on the match at around 35th minute and I couldnot believe the score 0-1. Then even worse Rapid Wien player moves inwards the box in a paralell way to the back line, unchallanged and even worse unhindered pulling the trigger.....great....the coefficient is on the descend. From what I've seen it makes the impression the guys think it is a friendly preseason match.
Honestly Ajax have been completely lifeless, to steal from Orange14's signature. You saw it in the first leg also...especially when Rapid were down to 10 men. There's no urgency, creativity or life to the way they play at all. It's depressing to watch. How far Ajax have fallen under de Boer. I could accept them losing to even teams like Rapid if they were actually playing real football. The worst thing possible happened when de Boer took over because the rest of the Eredivisie was so poor at the time. Ajax were able to walk the league regardless of the manager. He has always been poor in cup ties and Europe though. Hopefully he doesn't last the full season.
Why Gudelj took the outside instead of going between his man and the goal on that 3rd Rapid goal is beyond me. One of the dumbest defensive plays I've seen in a long time. He gave him a free lane.
In the first game Gudelj also had a strange moment of ball watching and overall apathy. Just repeats the theme with this one
It's evident that this is not a very good Ajax team. They are too slow in moving the ball around the field and allow the defense to get set. There is not enough quality to break down good defensive teams and end up with lots of meaningless possession. Defensive lapses on all three goals were horrible, one can see youth teams doing a better job than this Ajax team did tonight. If I were Cillessen I would put in for a transfer tomorrow, he's going to have a lot of problems this season. I don't think FdB is getting this team adequately prepared for knock out matches but then that's been a constant for the past four years. Player Ratings: Cillessen (5.5) - didn't have a lot to do and was powerless to stop any of the three goals; at least he didn't get a lot of back passes Dijks (5.5) - reasonably decent game and the cross to Milik was quite good Riedewald (4) - looked lost at times and should have done better on the first goal as he was way out of position; he has the tools but not the experience Veltman (5) - really don't understand why he was subbed off, Ajax were in a position to tie the match and having a 3 man back line anchored by an in experienced central defender is just a dumb manager's decision; otherwise he was average Tete (5) - OK game but why don't our right backs ever go forward? Sinkgraven (3.5) - really should have done better on the first two goals defensively Bazoer (5.5) - best of the midfielders tonight Klaassen (5) - average and not much better Fischer (4) - one stinging shot that was just wide but otherwise not as good as he needs to be Milik (5) - great volley for the goal and not much else el Ghazi (3.5) - lost the fullback on the first goal letting him cross the ball on offense found himself in too many 1 v 2 matchups and all he could do was some Mickey Mouse step overs that were not going to beat anybody Gudelj (5) - got a goal that probably should not have counted as Sanogo fouled the Vienna keeper Sanogo (4) - other than being big and strong, can he play football at all? Schöne (NR) - on too little to pass judgement I don't know if we automatically qualify for the EL group stage or not. Maybe that will be a good competition for this young team as I don't think they could beat any of the seeded teams in the next CL round.
He's on loan and I agree 100%; he appears to be a useless player and fouled the keeper on the 2nd Ajax goal and we are lucky it wasn't called.