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Match Report: Poor Ajax performance good enough to beat Fortuna

	Ex-Ajacied Jan van Halst duels with Shota Arveladze during Ajax' 3-0 win. [source: ANP]

16 February: What exactly changed so drastically this season, compared to the prvious seasons? Was it Fortuna, was it Ajax, or maybe a little bit of both? Two out of the last three times Ajax visited Sittard, it went incomprehensibly wrong for the Amsterdammers. This time a poor, often weak performance was good enough to make it 0-3 against the even weaker Limburgers, who seem to be on their way to the First Division.

Ajax's easy victory was not booked because Co Adriaanse's men played so well. The only one who did was, surprisingly, Holland's most discussed substitute player, Richard Witschge, who was in the line-up for the first time since 30 November. In default of Rafaël van der Vaart, who overburdened his ankle during the week, Witschge was voted 'Man of the Match'. The 31 year-old reacted indifferently: "Oh well, next week I'll be on the bench again anyway."

He's probably right, but his contributions to Ajax's victory over Fortuna were obvious. It was a beautiful Witschge pass which ripped Fortuna's defense apart, putting Wamberto in position on the left side. His low cross was badly defended and finished by a dry Galásek shot from just oustide the penalty box (10). Later on, another fine Witschge kick ended up on the forehead of Daniël Cruz, who had replaced struggling Nikos Machlas five minutes earlier and scored his first ever goal for Ajax-1, making it 0-3 (78). The second half, so far, had been hopelessly boring. Ajax apparently expected no danger from Fortuna - and the sad reality is that they were right.

In fact, Ajax only played well during the first 20 minutes, in which Fortuna was overrun and Christopher Kanu, Tomás Galásek, Nikos Machlas (unmissable chance in front of an emtpy goal) and Cedric van der Gun should have given Ajax a 0-3 or 0-4 lead. The latter missed too many chances throughout the game, but did seal Fortuna's fate after only 24 minutes. Wamberto was the provider again, launching Van der Gun, who ended his run though Fortuna's defense with a rolling shot that went just out of Ruud Hesp's reach: 0-2 (24).

Ajax's much too easy-going defense allowed Fortuna to create two scoring chances as well (Hamming and Heering both missed face-to-face with Fred Grim), but the adjective 'dangerous' would give the lonely Fortuna forwards too much credit. The Sittard team didn't even fight for a victory, except for one man: Jan van Halst, who was always in the right position to intercept Ajax passes, but couldn't make a miracle happen for his new club. Last year, in his only and dismal season with Ajax, he had the same problem. The fans were always loyal to him, though, and Van Halst had not forgotten about that: he threw a bouquet of flowers into the section of the Ajax fans before kick-off.

Ajax is far away from brilliance, at the moment, and should consider itself lucky with the recent league schedule. The 'easy' away games against small-timers De Graafschap (15th) and Fortuna Sittard (18th) came exactly at the right moment. Ajax has now leapfrogged Vitesse, and the upcoming weeks look promising: next week's home game against FC Utrecht will be tough, but the next away games are against RBC (17th), FC Groningen (14th) and after that Sparta (16th) is coming to the ArenA. The upcoming weeks may well be crucial in the race for the third position. Vitesse and its former chairman are involved in a nasty case of tax fraud and swindle and seem to have forgotten how to win - while Ajax meets the bottom teams of the Eredivisie. (MP)

GOALS

• 10' 0-1 Tomás Galásek
• 24' 0-2 Cedric van der Gun
• 78' 0-3 Daniël Cruz

Referee: Temmink
Cards: Van der Gun (Ajax)
Attendance: 13,000

Ajax line-up: Grim; Kanu, Pasanen, Chivu, De Cler; Galásek, Witschge; Van der Gun, Arveladze (80. Hersi), Machlas (73. Cruz), Wamberto.

Fortuna Sittard line-up: Hesp; Emeran, Volmer, Roest, Hermans; Heering, Van Halst, Van Barneveld, Haeldermans; Hamming, Gerritsen.