Sustain the Excellence: Ajax, 2019-20

They should double up efforts as Pierie and Sandler are by far superior on what the USA has, while their chances to get in the Orange shirt are dimm.

 

Article about Chelsea kids:
https://www.volkskrant.nl/sport/che...jax~b3772641/?referer=https://www.google.com/
Chelsea babes comfortable playing away match and are ready for Ajax.

 

I've said it a few times but the Alvarez/Martinez midfield pairing is just flat out not good enough technically. They can't pass at the level Ajax needs. Martinez killed tons of attacks with really poor decisions. I was hoping for Pröpper signing in the summer. He would be the perfect fit in the winter if we can sign him.

ten Hag subbing Promes was really strange. I thought he was easily the most dangerous player. I also thought he should have brought on Hunter sooner.

Chelsea was better and IMO deserved the win-- but having a goal disallowed by VAR is infuriating. The line that went up did not go to Promes' shoulder. Also how are we to believe those lines? I thought he looked on. I also can't 100% trust they marked the lines the exact moment that Ziyech played the ball. Nothing about it was "clear and obvious". Another total screw job.

 

1187063677129842692 is not a valid tweet id

Beerepoot Media met deze foto.
Maar dit lijkt me haast onmogelijk als dit zo is. https://t.co/UkF6nC8DzQ

— Kees Kwakman (@keeskwakman14) October 23, 2019

 

Today really showed how weak the midfield really is. Martinez and Alvarez are obviously solid defensively but they were complete liabilities moving forward. Their passing and decision making was awful. Tadic was also extremely weak today. Really struggled passing the ball. Dest had an extremely poor game and got pushed around before he got beat easily on the goal. The whole backline was sloppy on the goal though and did a poor job of defending.

I thought Donny worked hard but had trouble getting any service. Same thing with Promes. My man of the match would be Tagliafico though. Played pretty solid

 

Donny should drop deeper, put Promes/Neres in there as well. I thought that was working well.

When they first played the video of the Ziyech pass, it quite frankly did not look close to me. Those photos show Promes was on. What a total screw job.

 

Even being one millimeter offside is still offside

 

I almost knew right away it was going to be called back when you could see Promes himself had doubts. I'm not a big fan of how precise VAR is and how there are many goals where the 1 mm doesn't make a difference but rules are rules

 

Only watched the second half. Chelsea were stronger, faster, and overall hungrier... Ajax OTOH were too casual and sloppy, especially passing in the attacking third. That break-away 2v2 situation involving Tadic was pretty much summed up the game for me. Disappointing overall. Dest struggled to keep up with the physicality and pace of the game.

Blind was my MoTM in the second half. At least he read well, and looked to initiate attack from back.

 

In the Dest threads in the US forum they tell he was very good, apart from two posters with a completely other opinion.
Can't comment on it as I only saw the last ten minutes. With the goal Dest got beaten the same way he was against RKC. At first I thought it was Mazra's fault, but I missed he was subbed and Dest moved to the left wingback position.
Anyway, I can't see any future for him as an Orange back at all. There are guys in wait in the Uxx Orange teams, who are far better than him defensively.

 

LOL...Gullit has clear pictures and still cant get it right. Look at the first pic, the arm and hand of Promes is slightly offside. I know it sucks, but rules are rules:

https://www.telegraaf.nl/sport/1112291147/gullit-hier-is-het-bewijs-van-geldige-goal-promes

 

I drew a red line so you can see it better

 

I think you’re wrong Brilliant Dutch. In the picture where you drew the red line the ball is already off Ziyech’s foot. Plus that is shot at an angle, look at the line of the 16-box. In the earlier picture you cannot say with certainty that Promes’ arm is over the line because of the angle. Look for example at the arm of the defender, his also looks far over the line from that angle.

Point is that they used/showed the wrong frame and with the correct frame you cannot say with certainty it was offsides. If there is doubt the goal has to stand. It was a ridiculous decision. Ajax got ********ed over, terrible decision. Biases aside they cannot cancel out goals if there is no certainty!

 

Not in the first image. Supposedly thats the exact time it left Ziyech's foot. In the 2nd image is where the ball has already left his foot.

Anyways, it does no good arguing about this stuff because the call will never be overturned in a million years

 

Exactly but in the first image you absolutely cannot say with certainty he is offside. Look at the angle of the camera based on the box of 16. Look at the defenders arm which also looks way over the line. With it being this close the angle and exact moment of the shot makes all the difference. They simply cannot say it’s definitely offside, not even with a reasonable doubt. It is completely 50/50. It never should have been canceled.

Obviously now there’s nothing they can do and it will never be overturned. Ajax was shafted and we will have to accept that. But I think it definitely is worth talking about. The VAR needs to be criticized until it performs better. It pisses me off reading british news where they wax lyrical about the Chelsea team and mention nothing of this. Ajax wasn’t good, but Chelsea was extremely lucky given a wrongly disallowed goal and the post hit!

Hopefully Ajax will show up for the next game with a chip on their shoulder. If i’m this irritated i’m sure the Ajax players are livid. They should have been almost guaranteed lf qualification now. Lets hope they learn from this and become better.

 

I think this will light a fire under the Ajax players and they are gonna come out flying against Chelsea in London. The betting man in me says Ajax comes away with a win there.

But yes, a 0-0 draw would have been a great result and would have put us in a wonderful position to advance, especially considering goal differential and head to head vs Valencia and Lille. The group would have been 7, 4, 4, 1 with Ajax leading. Had the goal counted we almost certainly would have walked away with either a win or a draw, so to a lose the game after an 86th minute goal with all of the controversy feels really bad. If this ends up costing us progression it will forever remain in my memory along with the Lyon-Dinamo occasion as a moment when Ajax was robbed.

It is fine that the VAR made the decision, if it is the right decision I can only stand behind it. But it looks to be the wrong decision and the fact that the VAR has not come out with a clear statement proves that they know they cannot guarantee it was the right decision! There needs to be transparency. They either need to post the clip/image they used to make the decision or they need to admit to making a mistake. But radio silence and hoping it snows over is a ridiculous strategy. If VAR is to succeed there must be transparency!

 

Perhaps the best video yet:

https://www.voetbalzone.nl/videos.asp?uid=52169&cat=voetbalzone

Marcel Desailly Fifa ambassador says he will show the video to Fifa to reduce the chance of this happening again in the future.

 

So I was wrong because I thought the arms and hands could also be considered offside, which isnt true. Only the feet can be offside.

Looking at it again I have to agree that Promes does indeed look onside.
Have a look: https://www.ad.nl/video/de-var-fout-bij-de-goal-van-promes-ga-ik-aankaarten~p108700

Having said that, there's no way in hell this call will ever be overturned

 

It definitely wont be, how could they overturn it? It is a moment that changed the entire course of the game.

We were robbed and the VAR made a ridiculously unnecessary decision that will have big implications for Ajax. Chances of us advancing are now in jeopardy and ending #1 is much less likely meaning that even if we do advance we will face a much stronger team.

I for one am pissed. Horrible horrible decision.