Clubs reach agreement, Julien Escude signs four year Ajax contract
17 July: Ajax
contracted its first ever French player today: Julien
Escudé, left-footed defender of Stade Rennes. There was
an agreement between Ajax and Escudé since last week,
but an extra week and a personal visit to Rennes by Ajax's
general director Arie van Eijden were required for the clubs to
agree on the transfer fee. Escudé signed a contract for
four years.
Julien Escudé was born on 17 August 1979 in Chartres,
France and started playing professional football at AS Cannes
in the French Second Division in 1998-1999. He played 18 games
for Cannes and scored one goal before being transferred to
Stade Rennes (official name: Stade Rennais FC), for which club
he played for four seasons. According to Ajax.nl he played 103
French league games (1 goal). VI.nl, however, claims that he
played 111 French league games without scoring.
His international experience is rather limited so far: he
played four Intertoto games with Stade Rennes and is a regular
in the French U-21 team, for which team he made his
début on 22 February 2000. He had 21 appearances for
France U-21 so far (1 goal). He is expected to make the jump to
France's national team soon.
Julien Escudé, the younger brother of tennis
professional Nicolas Escudé (currently 60th on the ATP
world ranking), has been on Ronald Koeman's wishlist for a long
time. His name appeared in the Dutch media months ago as the
preferred successor in case of a Cristian Chivu departure.
As usual Ajax did not reveal the transfer fee paid for
Escudé. Ajax's first bid was dismissed as "absolutely
insufficient" by Stade Rennes, after which general director
Arie van Eijden travelled to France to discuss the transfer fee
in person. Dutch newspaper Het Parool reported
yesterday that Stade Rennes wanted five million euros for the
defender, whereas Ajax only wanted to pay four million. It is
safe to assume that the transfer fee is somewhere in between
and that Ajax spent no more than some 30% of the transfer fee
received for Cristian Chivu on a successor.
According to Arie van Eijden Julien Escudé will join
his new team-mates in their De Lutte training camp today. It is
unknown whether he will make his first Ajax appearance in
tonight's friendly fixture against Koninklijke UD in Deventer.
An appearance in Saturday game at DVS '33 in Ermelo seems more
likely.
Ajax, meanwhile, intends to present at least one more new
player this week. The Amsterdam club is said to be talking to
officials of Polish side Wisla Krakow about the transfer of 20
year-old Nigerian winger Kalu Uche, the preferred successor of
Andy van der Meyde. (MP)
Sources: Ajax.nl, VI.nl and Het Parool
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