Ajax put a lot of pressure on AZ in the first half. The manager explained why. "We had a lot of people in the line and that may not always have been good in the beginning of the game, but we managed to get the ball moving.
"I thought it was a lot less in the second half", added the coach. "This is also ultimately why we had the two counter-goals. There was not enough willingness to break free. So then we need to put more energy into the match. With the counter-goals we didn't defend properly, which shouldn't happen."
'Keep the spirit'
All in all Ten Hag declared himself satisfied with the 2-2 draw with AZ. "We still have everything in our own hands" We need to keep the spirit and the trust going. Now we will focus on sc Heerenveen."
Davy Klaassen also felt that Ajax were finding things difficult. "It was a tough match", he said. "In the first half we played quite well. We were getting up the field well, but the final pass was missing."
"In the second half we failed to retain the ball enough. AZ also started to apply some pressure, causing us to start to play long balls too quickly. We made the wrong choices."