The tide could be about to turn in the Netherlands, where Ajax Amsterdam have consistently been the league champions for the last four seasons. PSV Eindhoven will be eager to get one up on Ajax who are undergoing wholesale changes within its first-team fold.
History often repeats itself and, not for the first time nor the last, Ajax is having its team picked apart by European heavyweights. So far four players (as well as the manager) have departed from Amsterdam this summer and with 10 weeks remaining of the transfer window, the mass exodus may yet be far from over.
Ryan Gravenberch and Noussair Mazraoui have both switched to German champions Bayern Munich, while goalkeeper André Onana is poised to join Inter Milan on a free transfer. Manager Erik ten Hag left for Manchester United and in-form striker Sebastien Haller is close to signing for Borussia Dortmund.
Ten Hag is said to be interested in signing one or two of his former players, which could see Ajax depleted of more than half of its starting 11 from this past season and in need of a substantial rebuild. Lisandro Martinez and Antony might each be subject to exits from Amsterdam in the coming months.
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Looking to capitalise on the ongoing reshuffle in the capital will be regular title challengers PSV. The Eindhoven-based team have finished among the top two in all of the last four full Eredivisie seasons. They ended just two points behind the champions in 2021/22 and three points shy of Ajax in 2018/19. Despite narrowly missing out on league success this year, PSV beat Ajax 2-1 in the final of the KNVB Cup.
PSV last won the Eredivisie in 2018, but Ten Hag’s appointment at Ajax midway through that campaign subsequently saw the Amsterdammers embark on a dominant streak of three league titles in four years. PSV have been vastly overshadowed by their Topper rivals and, since the inception of the Eredivisie in 1956, Ajax have claimed 28 league titles compared to PSV’s 21.
Since 2000, PSV & Ajax have been crowned Eredivisie winners in all but three seasons, not including the 2019/20 campaign which was abandoned due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The two biggest clubs in Dutch football, historically and in modern times, Ajax and PSV have each undergone managerial changes ahead of the forthcoming 2022/23 season. Ten Hag’s move to Manchester sees him replaced by Alfred Schreuder, meanwhile Dutch legend Ruud van Nistelrooy succeeds outgoing PSV boss Roger Schmidt. This is just the fourth time in the last 60 years that PSV and Ajax have both changed managers for the start of a new season.
As a player Van Nistelrooy was top scorer in the Eredivisie in back-to-back seasons with PSV, before completing a big-money move to Man United in 2001, a year later than expected. The Red Devils captured the Premier League title in 2003 as the Dutch striker scored 25 goals to claim both the Golden Boot and Player of the Season awards, and he also got his hands on the FA Cup the following year.
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Van Nistelrooy was top goalscorer three times in the UEFA Champions League during his five-year stay in England, following which he went on to play for Real Madrid and Malaga in Spain as well as German side Hamburg. He earned 70 caps for the Dutch national team, scoring 35 goals for Die Oranje before hanging up his boots in 2012.
Van Nistelrooy went into coaching and, aged 37, he began working with the PSV under-17 team. In 2016 he took up a role as striker coach with Eindhoven’s youth and reserve teams and two years later he was named in charge of the reserves, Jong PSV, following Mark van Bommel’s promotion to manager of the senior team.
He has also enjoyed two spells as assistant manager with the Netherlands national team, first under Guus Hiddink (and later Hiddink’s successor Danny Blind) after the 2014 FIFA World Cup. More recently he was part of Ronald Koeman’s backroom staff leading up to the 2020 European Championships.
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Now, with a decade of coaching under his belt, Van Nistelrooy is braced for his first job in senior management as he takes over PSV’s first-team from July 2022 on a three-year deal. Van Nistelrooy will have André Ooijer as one of his right-hand men after the majority of Schmidt’s backroom staff also left the club.
Ooijer, 47, has worked under all of the last four PSV managers (Schmidt, Van Bommel, Phillip Cocu, and Ernest Faber) after starting in a junior coaching capacity in 2013 – a similar time frame to Van Nistelrooy. Ooijer is two years the senior of Van Nistelrooy and the two played together 19 times with the Dutch national team.
PSV’s triad of Eran Zahavi, Mario Götze and Cody Gakpo scored a combined 53 goals across all competitions last term, albeit Zahavi and Götze have each returned to their native leagues signing for Maccabi Tel Aviv and Eintracht Frankfurt, respectively. Unless Gakpo is headhunted by a top European club, the 23-year-old Dutch winger will be a key figure in spearheading Van Nistelrooy’s attack next season.
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The new boss will be determined to keep hold of midfielder Ibrahim Sangaré amidst links of a switch to the Premier League. PSV are yet to make a marquee signing although they have so far acquired 20-year-old full-back Ki-Jana Hoever – a former product of the Ajax academy – on a season-long loan from Premier League side Wolves.
Argentine goalkeeper Walter Benitez has signed for Eindhoven on a free transfer after six years with French outfit Nice. PSV are also on the verge of signing Dutch midfielder Xavi Simons, 19, on loan from Paris Saint-Germain.
After several of years of unbridled success, there may well be a Ruud awakening on the cards for Ajax next season.
