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Victory, with Roda loss, hands Ajax 3rd place and CL berth

	Rafael van der Vaart celebrates with Petri Pasanan. [source: ANP]

On the very last day of the season, Ajax managed to get into the preliminary round of the Champions League. With a 5-1 victory over AZ combined with a 3-2 loss by Roda, Ajax climbed in the standing from position 4 to the important position 3. Adriaanse's goal at the beginning of the season (a position in the top five) was therefore amply achieved.

Two of the other goals this year was to play attacking soccer with young players of Ajax' own youth academy. Also these two goals became clearly visible this Sunday. Ajax added no less than 5 goals to their impressive total, and with 85 goals they became the most productive team in the Eredivisie. That Adriaanse kept his promise about lining up younger players was visible at the end of the game. With Pasanen, Yakubu, Chivu, Van der Vaart, Ikedia, Cruz, Van der Gun and Van der Meyde the average age of the attendant players can be called extremely young.

The afternoon started perfectly for Ajax. After only 20 minutes Ajax took the lead with a lucky goal by Van der Vaart. By that time the supporters on the stands could have known that Roda at the same time was 0-1 behind. But instead of celebrating this good result most of the fanatic f-side supporters rather seem to worry about the silly remarks Richard Witschge made this week abusing coach Adriaanse. The crowd sided with Witschge and shouted his name for many minutes. Ironically Witschge was perfectly able to hear these expressions of sympathy since he was also on the stands himself (not on the f-side, however). Because for the second time in a row he was left out of the selection.

From that spot he could see how his direct substitute Van der Vaart grew into the best player on the pitch, thereby underscoring Adriaanse's right. After Boussatta had scored the equalizer, Van der Vaart scored his (and Ajax') second goal of the day, after a nice pass from Yakubu (30').

On that same moment RKC scored their second goal against Roda and a surprise was in the air. The only thing that Ajax had to do was not to lose. Two other players of the so-called Vander-generation took care of that. First Van der Meyde (52') with a beautiful 30 meters free-kick and later on Van der Gun (71') secured the victory. In between Arveladze (59') scored with a nice header, already his 18th goal of the season.

Because of this victory and because of the defeat of Roda, Ajax was able to celebrate a small party afterwards. Cristian Chivu was voted best player of the season and Van der Vaart most talented player of the season. With a small lap of honour the players celebrated the preliminary round of the Champions League. In August Ajax has to prove that they are ready for that job. Before that, Adriaanse has a lot to do to improve the Ajax defense. The goal of AZ was already the 43rd Ajax got scored against. And that is way to many for European standards. (BV)

GOALS

• 22'  1-0  Rafaël van der Vaart
• 26'  1-1  Dries Boussatta
• 30'  2-1  Rafaël van der Vaart
• 52'  3-1  Andy van der Meyde
• 59'  4-1  Shota Arveladze
• 71'  5-1  Cedric van der Gun

Referee: Temmink
Yellow card: O´Brien (Ajax)
Attendance: 36,565

Ajax line-up: Grim; O'Brien, Pasanen, Yakubu, De Cler (73. Chivu); Galásek, Arveladze (63. Van der Gun), Van der Vaart; Ikedia, Machlas (63. Cruz), Van der Meyde.

AZ line-up: Timmer; Lee, Buskermolen, Wijker, Opdam; Kromkamp (78. Wolters), Mans (69. Bouchiba), Matthijs; Boussatta, Dibi, Huiberts (76. Perez).