MyPa eliminated: Ajax face Denmark's strongest in CL qualifiers
02 August: As expected, Ajax face FC
København in the third preliminary round of the
Champions League. The reigning Danish
champions easily remained upright in Helsinki,
in the return leg of their clash with MyPa-47 (2-2),
beating the Finns by the score of 4-2 on aggregate. Ajax
will travel to Copenhagen for the first leg on Wednesday 09
August (kick-off time t.b.c.). The return leg in Amsterdam is
on Wednesday 23 August at 20:30 CET. A first round (group
stage) berth in this season's UEFA Champions League is at
stake.
Myllykosken Pallo '47,
one of the Finnish clubs Jari Litmanen played for before
joining Ajax, battled bravely in the return leg in Finland this
evening and equalized twice, but the third round berth of 'FCK'
was never seriously in danger after last week's
2-0 win at Parken in Copenhagen. Both Danish
goals in Finland were Swedish: Linderoth and former Roda
JC man Berglund scored for the reigning
Danish and Scandinavian champions.
So much for MyPa. Just
like last year, Ajax's last obstacle on the road to
the Champions League is a football club from Denmark. This
time, however, it's not Brøndby IF but their local
arch-rivals: FC København.
The
Club
'FCK', as the club's name is normally abbreviated, is a
young club. Founded on 01 July 1992, FC
København is a merger of two illustrious Copenhagen
sides: B 1903, who won seven Danish championships, and BK,
who won the Danish league no less than fifteen times. BK
was actually the oldest football club on mainland Europe
(founded 1876) and in fact... still is. Both B
1903 and BK still exist as amateur clubs developing young
talent for FCK.
The 1992 merger had the intention to
lift FCK to the level of success that city
rivals Brøndby IF had reached, but was absolutely
out of the question for either B 1903 or KB. The
merger almost immediately yielded the desired result: FCK
won the Danish championship in their first season of
existence (1993). However, they weren't there to stay just
yet. In the years thereafter the club had a number of modest
years and slipped away from the top of Danish
football for a few years.
The turning points was 1997, when the club sold a vast
amount of stock, became publicly owned and (in 1998)
became the owner of the national stadium of
Idraetsparken, re-naming it Parken. In 2001 the
silverware started falling from the sky for FCK and it's still
coming down. The club won the Danish SAS
Leagues of 2001, 2003, 2004 and 2006 and grabbed the
Danish Cup in 2004.
Moreover, the brand-new 'Champions League of
Scandinavia' - the Royal League - was won in 2005 and
2006. There is no denial: FCK, who play their home games in all
white, are the Nordic nations' undisputed number one football
club today.
The Roster
This season's roster shows us
how spectacularly FCK have developed. When Ajax
played FC København in the UEFA Cup in the fall of
2001 (and were painfully eliminated) only one or two names in
the FCK line-up sounded familiar to the average Dutch fan. Look
at the names that will play Ajax this time: Tobias Linderoth
and Markus Allbäck are two experienced and well-respected
Swedish internationals who spent years in the English
Premiership and played at World Cup and Euro tournaments with
Sweden. Allbäck also spent a number of seasons in the
Dutch Eredivisie (at SC Heerenveen).
Allbäck isn't the only FCK man with a Dutch history:
Fredrik Berglund (another Swede!) played for Roda JC and there
are two former Ajacieden in the squad: Norwegian defender
André Bergdølmo now wears the white strip of
FCK, whereas this summer's most prestigious signing was
winger and Danish international Jesper
Grønkjær, who played for Ajax before moving on to
Chelsea, Atletico Madrid and VfB Stuttgart. More top
drawer players? What about Razak Pimpong, an international for
World Cup over-achievers Ghana and an entertaining fan
favourite in midfield.
Indeed: in 2001 the FCK line-up didn't really ring a bell in
Amsterdam. Today, FCK is a solid, experienced,
pan-Scandinavian side that you could describe as
'star-studded' without much exaggeration. The man at the
helm is Ståle Solbakken, a former FCK player who had to
call it quits when he got a heart-attack in 2001. In
early 2006 the Norwegian returned as head-coach,
only 27 years of age. According to the FCK website "he
prefers the 4-4-2 formation with quick switch-overs and direct
passing."
The Stadium
Parken, the ground formerly known as Idraetsparken, was
purchased by FCK in 1998 and is Denmark's national stadium. The
stadium has its own website, which
also features some information in English. If you're
interested in the business aspects of the ground's
history, read
this. Want to go there? This is
how to get there. If you feel like it you can go
on a
guided tour of the stadium.
Parken, near Copenhagen's Østerport Station, has
42,305 seats. FCK had hardly ever sold the place out back
in 2001 (20,067 people watched the UEFA Cup tie against
Ajax on 18 October 2001), but next
Wednesday Ajax can expect a (nearly) full house. Indeed, FCK
have become a bigger club in every way.
Ajax versus Danish opposition
The first time Ajax played FC København in UEFA
competition was also the first time for Ajax to be paired with
a Danish club. This was in the fall of 2001, in the second
round of the UEFA Cup, and the Amsterdammers crashed out
in painful fashion: after a 0-0 draw at Parken on
18 October, Niclas Jensen scored a late, decisive winner at the
Amsterdam ArenA in the return leg two weeks later. The
elimination was part of a string of poor results that
would cost Ajax head-coach Co Adriaanse his job.
The second (and most recent) time for Ajax to play a Danish
side was last summer, in the third preliminary round
of the Champions League. The opponents were coach Michael
Laudrup's
Brøndby IF and this time Ajax did not
fail, although it definitely wasn't easy. At Brøndby
Stadium, on 10 August 2006, Ajax took the lead twice, but
conceded an equalizer in stoppage time and had to settle for a
2-2 draw. It all seemed to go horribly wrong at the
Amsterdam ArenA on on
24 August, when Brøndby outplayed Ajax in the first
half and took the lead, only to see Ajax resurrect in the
second half, for their first ever win over a Danish opponent in
'Europe': 3-1 and the Dutch advanced to the group stage.
Reactions
After the draw in Nyon on 28 July, the return leg between
MyPa-47 and FC København was yet to be played,
but head-coach Henk ten Cate, midfielder Wesley Sneijder
and Ajax's 'Dutch Dane', Kenneth Perez, didn't really seem
to count on a MyPa upset anymore... and they were
right.
Head-coach Henk ten Cate: "The league has
already started for FCK, so physically they will be a step
ahead of us. But by the time we play them we will be ready for
it, too. Against this type of opponent you must make sure you
stay out of physical duels. Instead, you have to pass the ball
around quickly and accurately. That is our style anyway. We
definitely have chances, but there is no reason for
euphoria. FC Copenhagen are a side that can cause
a surprise. Everybody will say that Ajax are the
favourites. Which is good, in a way: if you want to
compete at this level you must be able to deal
with the pressure. I would have preferred not to play the first
'finals' this early in the season, but that's the reality we're
facing and I hope many more 'finals' will follow. The
progress of the team sure makes me hopeful."
Midfielder Wesley Sneijder: "I think you
can compare the FC Copenhagen games to last season's
Brøndby games. Due to Brøndby's physical power we
got into trouble in the second half in Denmark. But we are a
different team now. I kind of like this draw. I think two
good games are ahead. We will be top fit by the time we play
them and I think pure football quality will be
decisive."
Danish forward Kenneth Perez
(who still owns a flat in Copenhagen, only five minutes
from Parken...): "This is a nice draw for my family and
friends. I must have received about a hundred phonecalls
now, all of them from numbers starting with
00-45. In theory, this is a very strong opponent. They
have two Swedish internationals, Albäck and Linderoth, and
I think they have four Danish internationals. Jesper
Grønkjær has just been purchased.
Pimpong, an international for Ghana, plays for FCK,
too. And André Bergdølmo. They play in a 4-4-2
formation and they have a lot of physical and aerial power.
Last year Ajax feared the set pieces in the games against
Brøndby, and I think the same danger will be there
against FCK. FC København is a very ambitious club
and it most definitely won't be easy." (MP)
Sources: Ajax USA archive, FCK.dk
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