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I felt a bit shaky first thing today as I got up and prepared myself for work. The nightmare of the train running me down had disturbed my usually solid sleep pattern and I had only dozed lightly on and off for several hours after falling out of bed. I knew that meeting young Martin Hofstede had triggered the return of the nightmare, but if the kid was going to be a fixture around the club when we signed him, then I had better get used to it. I had gotten over the death of Jordy Hofstede the first time when it had been quite a shock to me and I was sure that I could handle this reminder and get on with my life now as well. There was no time for much further thought on the matter this morning anyway – I had a football team to manage and I wasn’t going to let the return of some old nightmare make a difference to my new job.
As I had turned in early last night I hadn’t caught up on the results of the UEFA Cup 1st Round matches which were played on Thursday evening. AZ had gone to Sweden to play Elfsborg and they returned with a 2-0 win courtesy of goals by Tim de Cler and Robin Nelisse. Heerenveen had hosted Dinamo Tirana of Albania and had suffered a shock 3-1 defeat. Bakalli and Asllani had Dinamo 2-0 up before Youssouf Hersi pulled back a late goal to give Heerenveen some hope. However in injury-time Asllani scored his second goal and made the final score 3-1. Feyenoord also had a bad defeat as they lost 1-0 to Olumets goal for Lev Tallinn of Estonia. It was Utrecht who had the poorest result of the night for Holland when they were comprehensively beaten 3-0 at home by German 2nd Division Aachen. All three goals came in the first half from Petrovic and Plaßherich (2).
After training this afternoon I went to the Arke Stadion in the evening and watched as the reserves beat NEC 4-1. As well as being there to look at the youngsters, I also had instructed Jeffrey Kooistra to play Karim El Ahmadi, Raymond Fafiani and Kim Christensen. The fringe first team players all had good performances with Christensen scoring a goal, but reserve striker Tim Velten used the opportunity to remind me that he was waiting in the wings as he scored a fine hat-trick. Youngsters Gerald Postma and Peter van Putten celebrated their new contracts with fine performances as well.
After the reserves match I watched on as 16 year old Rene Lord signed a four year deal with FC Twente. With a bit of spit and polish from the coaching staff, plus Jeffrey and me, young Lord may well turn into a quality player for the club.
In the other game tonight Den Haag returned to the top of the Premier Division as they recorded a 3-1 victory over Vitesse. Roy Stroeve, Geert den Ouden and Jamie Smith all scored for Den Haag whilst Kwame Cruden got the solitary reply for Vitesse.
Saturday 15th September 2001:
The first of the matches between the big three – PSV, Ajax and Feyenoord – was played today as PSV visited Amsterdam to play Ajax. Two first half goals by American international DaMarcus Beasley had PSV in front and they looked comfortable until South Korean midfielder Park Ji-Sung was sent off for two yellow card offences midway through the second half. Ajax attempted to fight back, but PSV hung on for a 2-0 win. The other game of the day saw a highly entertaining 3-3 draw between Roda and RBC. Edrissa Sonko opened the scoring for Roda, but a double to Fouad Makhout and a third to Jesper Hakansson put RBC 3-1 up midway through the second half. That was a sign for a Roda fight-back and Diego Jongen and a second for Sonko bought the final score to 3-3.
02-04-2005, 12:31 AM
“He’s one of Holland’s brightest managerial prospects” Post #32
Our visit to Nijmegen to play NEC saw us venturing to a ground where the home team had one win and two losses in their three matches. Coupled with their poor away form, that saw NEC lying in 12th place as they prepared to face us today. However NEC had a wily manager in former great Johan Neeskens and he would operate a standard 4-4-2 system in all likelihood. The players that we would need to pay special attention to were midfielder/forward Romano Denneboom and the young striker Frank Demouge who was already in prolific form with 5 goals in just 4 games.
I decided to stick with the same team that had defeated RBC 3-1 last week. Blaise N’Kufo and Guilherme Afonso had both found the net, so I couldn’t justify splitting them up to fit the now healthy Johnnier Montano back into the team. Resit Schuurman would have to cool his heels on the bench for another week as Rahim held onto his place at right-back. The rest of the team was picking itself based on the form that those players were displaying. Simon Cziommer and Daniel Majstorovic were in particularly scintillating form and Bas Sibum wasn’t far behind the pair of them.
NEC had a lot of the ball as the match started, but they didn’t really do much with it. Boschker had a couple of back-passes to deal with, but we weren’t really tested in any way. Culina fired in a 20 yarder which NEC keeper Gentenaar held easily, but then our first serious attacking move led to the opening goal. 19 minutes had passed when Heubach and Goncalves continued their good understanding on the left side of the park as they worked some space for Goncalves to cross low towards the near post. Cziommer went to meet the ball and a clumsy challenge by Pothuizen saw him barge the German in the back. Cziommer’s fall was slightly theatrical, but the referee correctly awarded us a penalty. N’Kufo stepped up as previously arranged and sent Gentenaar the wrong way to put us 1-0 up. Both keepers then pulled off fine saves as Gentenaar foiled Afonso and Boschker saved excellently from Barreto. However we were gradually increasing the pressure and only some inspired goalkeeping by Gentenaar was stopping us from increasing our lead. From consecutive corners the NEC keeper defied Majstorovic and Touzani when they both connected with powerful headers. He then blocked N’Kufo’s low shot with his legs as our Swiss striker burst through the middle. Half-time was approaching and I felt that we were deserving of second goal. Instead on a rare breakaway Leiwakabessy broke down the left beyond Rahim and whipped in a cross which favoured Can. Heubach fouled Can in attempting to reach around him and NEC were awarded a penalty of their own. Centre-half Wisgerhof came forward and wasted no time in blasting his spot-kick high into the net despite Boschker getting a hand to it. It was now 1-1 after 40 minutes and that is how it stayed until the break.
In the first 20 minutes of the second half Gentenaar proved that he was having one of those brilliant days for goalkeepers where every dive he made produced a superb save just as it looked likely that we would score. Afonso’s15 yard half-volley, Culina’s curling free-kick from 20 yards and Cziommer’s dipping 18 yard volley were all brilliantly saved by the NEC keeper and the home crowd were lapping up his display. Although the players were doing nothing wrong, I decided that a change of personnel might bring something new to the team and having Montano on the bench meant that I had just the right player to bring some flamboyance into the team. At 68 minutes I called Afonso off and sent the Colombian on his place. Montano had been champing at the bit to get on and he immediately pepped up the forward line. Culina soon worked himself some space on the right and chipped a delicate pass into Montano who volleyed it inches over the cross bar with an effort that Gentenaar probably wouldn’t have saved had it been on target. As the final ten minutes approached it seemed that NEC had decided that a point was good enough for them and they started to play deeper in their own half. Their defence was tiring, but Montano was still fresh and he ran them ragged. In the 82nd minute N’Kufo prodded the ball through for Montano and he surged into the penalty area. Wisgerhof stuck out a hopeful leg and Montano went tumbling over it. The call for a penalty was immediate and the referee considered it for several seconds before waving play on. I couldn’t believe that he hadn’t given it and neither could the players. Sibum, Cziommer and Montano all surrounded the referee to complain, but he waved them away. In the 86th minute Culina produced an almost identical chipped pass for Montano as he had when the Colombian had first come on. However this time Montano kept his volley a few inches lower and from 14 yards it rocketed into the roof of the NEC net to put us 2-1 in front. Despite his earlier heroics Gentenaar couldn’t deny Montano and our efforts had deservedly been rewarded with what looked like a winning goal. There was even time for Cziommer to hit the outside of the post with a close-range effort which might have increased our winning margin.
NEC 1 Wisgerhof 40 pen FC Twente 2 N’Kufo 19 pen, Montano 84
As was my usual habit, I slipped out the post-match celebrations to check on the other results from today’s round of Premier Division matches. AZ had hosted Feyenoord and AZ’s Stein Huysegems and Feyenoord’s Danko Lazovic had traded two goals each in an entertaining first half. Kenneth Perez then scored a second half goal to win the match 3-2 for AZ. Rene Bot had put de Graafschap in front at Heerenveen, but Arnold Bruggink had equalised in a 1-1 draw. Mile Krstev scored his second winner in four days for Groningen as they won 1-0 at NAC. On-loan midfielder Alfred Schreuder scored the only goal as RKC beat Willem II 1-0 whilst Den Bosch went back to the top of the table with a 3-0 win at Utrecht. Dennis Schulp opened the scoring for Den Bosch and they got an easier ride when Hans van der Haar was sent off for Utrecht after 10 minutes. Jorge Bajana and a Joost Broerse own goal completed the scoring for Den Bosch in the second half.
02-04-2005, 03:09 AM
“He’s one of Holland’s brightest managerial prospects” Post #33
I was disappointed when I came back to the boards to see that your Boy from the Black Stump story had come to a halt. This is, as that was, a very good read keep it up :thup:
02-04-2005, 07:40 AM
“He’s one of Holland’s brightest managerial prospects” Post #35
My assistant manger Jeffrey Kooistra has completed his assessment of the players in the reserve and youth teams and he had decided that one final player should be offered a full contract. Patrick Hoekman, an 18 year old goalkeeper, was offered a three year contract. He signed on today, therefore giving me four goalkeepers at the club, and this gave me comfort that the goalkeeping side of the playing staff was now fully covered.
After having recovered from his earlier shoulder injury and going on to make two appearances in the league, Karim Touzani today twisted his knee in training and is expected to be out for at least two weeks. This has disrupted my plans for the Amstel Cup match against Scheveningen on Saturday as I was planning to give Majstorovic a rest and play Zomer with Touzani. It now looks like Zomer will get his game, but he will be partnering the Swede instead.
Tonight’s Champions Cup action saw Ajax lose 3-0 in France to Lyon. Frau, Wiltord and Diarra all scored in the opening half to send Ajax back home with a lot of thinking to do.
Wednesday 19th September 2001:
I was in the office early today to complete a few tasks before I attended the signing of our latest youngster. Normally as the first team manager I would leave this to Jeffrey, but there was a special significance to the signing of Martin Hofstede. Just over 13 years ago his brother Jordy had been one of my best mates before his tragic death. I knew that Martin’s father would be accompanying him to the signing and indeed, would be countersigning the contract as Martin was still 2 months shy of his 16th birthday. It was only polite that I went and saw Mr Hofstede and reacquainted myself with him after all these years.
The signing was scheduled for 11.00am but Martin Hofstede and his father were already at the boardroom at 10.45am. Martin was sitting outside with Jeffrey, talking as they overlooked the pitch of the Arke Stadion. His father saw me walk into the room and he rose to greet me. Aaron Hofstede was looking very fit and healthy for a man that I knew was in his mid-50’s. I held out my hand as I approached him. Mr Hofstede, it is so good to see you after all these years, I said. He took my hand and shook it with a firm grip. Peter, it is good to see you too. You must be happy to be back in Twente after your time in England, he replied. Yes, it’s good to be back home, I agreed. We spent a couple of minutes catching up on how his family were and how my career had gone since I had last seen him over 13 years ago.
Peter, you’ll keep an eye on young Martin for me, won’t you? said Mr Hofstede as we prepared for the lad to sign his contract. I looked up at him as he continued. He has his heart set on making it big here at FC Twente and he wants to do it so bad for the sake of poor Jordy. Martin was just two when Jordy died and he never really knew his older brother, but he idolises him and he wants to have the career that Jordy never quite achieved. I saw the concern in the face of the Aaron Hofstede. I knew that the Hofstedes were a deeply religious family and that had they had their way, first Jordy, and now Martin would not probably have been involved in football. But both of them had been blessed with natural talent and the boys had loved the game, so their father had relented. I put my hand on Mr Hofstede’s shoulder and said Aaron, I’ll look after him. I feel like I failed Jordy all those years ago and I’m not going to let anything bad happen to Martin as a result.
The formalities continued and a minute later 15 year old Martin Hofstede was officially a FC Twente player for the next four years.
There were several Premier Division games that had been rescheduled from earlier in the season when the European competitions had begun and they were being contested over the next few days. Tonight AZ hosted Willem II in Alkmaar and the visitors had the worst possible start when Martijn Reuser, newly returned to Holland from Ipswich in England, was sent off in the 2nd minute for dissent. Two goals from Tarik Sektioui and one from Ali Elkhattabi quickly gave AZ a 3-0 lead and they consolidated that into a 4-0 win when Sektioui scored his hat-trick from the penalty spot midway through the second half.
PSV suffered their second consecutive 2-0 loss in the Champions Cup when they went to Spain and fell to a double from Ronaldo as Real Madrid won 2-0 in the Bernabeu stadium.
Friday 21st September 2001:
With another round of internationals coming up in the first week of October, the squads were named today. Dmitri Shoukov received a call-up to the Russian team whilst Blaise N’Kufo and Guilherme Afonso were again called up by Switzerland. Peter Niemeyer was selected for the German Under-21 team.
The catch-up matches continued tonight in the Premier Division as PSV played Utrecht. PSV had quickly established their superiority and taken a 2-0 half-time lead through a double by Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink. However keeper Edwin Zoetebier sent off for fouling Sandro Calabro and Dave van den Bergh scored from the spot after 76 minutes to ensure a tense finish for PSV. They managed to hold on and record a 2-1 win which moved them up to 3rd place on the table.
02-08-2005, 09:49 PM
“He’s one of Holland’s brightest managerial prospects” Post #37
The Amstel Cup draw still contained many amateur teams and we were facing one of them today. Scheveningen had come through Group 3 of the qualifying stage as runners-up to First Division side Telstar. However their league form in their own competition indicated that they were not having the best of starts to the new season. I expected another 5-3-2 defensive formation from our visitors and didn’t give them much more thought. To be honest, we had the personnel to wipe them off the park and I expected the players to achieve that result.
The fact that we were playing amateur opposition gave me the chance to try a couple of new faces and indulge in a bit of position shuffling. Ramon Zomer came in for the injured Karim Touzani at centre-half whilst Resit Schuurman returned at right-back as Rahim moved to left-back allowing Jeroen Heubach to have a rest. In midfield Raymond Fafiani would start on the left in place of Goncalves whilst Johnnier Montano would take up Jason Culina’s role as the link man between midfield and attack. On the bench Kim Christensen and Karim El Ahmadi could expect to get a run at some stage.
Scheveningen made their plans fairly obvious right from the start when they lined up with a five man defence. They then kicked off and showed little desire to move forward. Fafiani started brightly with a couple of good runs on the left before he set up Cziommer for the first real chance after 8 minutes. Scheveningen’s keeper Thies was obviously nervous and he pushed Cziommer’s shot away for a corner when it was clearly going well wide. Fafiani took the corner and Jacobs fouled Zomer as he attempted to clear the ball, thus giving us a penalty after only 9 minutes. N’Kufo confidently slotted it home for his 5th goal in all competitions this season. After that we pretty much set up camp in the Scheveningen half and proceeded to take up some shooting practice. Afonso, N’Kufo and Cziommer all had goal-bound efforts denied by Thies or his overworked defenders. Fafiani was proving to be a source of great creativity with his play on the left and was obviously relishing the chance to impress me. As half-time approached I felt comfortable with our performance so far and confident that more goals would come. Montano then popped up in the 45th minute to make the score 2-0 as he hammered home the rebound after Thies could only block Afonso’s header from yet another enticing Fafiani cross.
The second half started off where the first half ended as we continued to pressurise the Scheveningen goal. Then suddenly out of the blue our opponents pulled a goal back. It was so simple. A long clearance bounced over Zomer, Majstorovic slipped and suddenly their lone striker van der Laan was away and in the clear. Boschker came out to meet him, but he cleverly chipped the ball over our keeper and it was now 2-1 after 54 minutes. It took six minutes for us to reply. Montano broke down the right wing and crossed and Thies flapped at the ball, succeeding in knocking it only as far as Sibum who was standing 10 yards from goal. Sibum needed no further invitation and he crashed the ball into the net for 3-1. I decided that we were looking fairly safe and so I sent on El Ahmadi for Cziommer and Goncalves for Sibum. Within minutes that change had produced outstanding results. On 68 minutes Fafiani picked up a loose ball and worked his way to the bye-line before crossing back to the penalty spot where Goncalves arrived perfectly on time to volley home his first goal for the club. Just 2 minutes later and Schuurman overlapped down the right wing before sending over a far post cross which Afonso unselfishly headed back into the middle. El Ahmadi had timed his run well and from 6 yards out he bundled the ball into the net with his knee for a goal on his first team debut. That made the score 5-1 and I was now extremely happy with the performance of the team as the score-line now more accurately reflected our dominance of the match. At this point the boys probably took their foot of the accelerator and cruised through the final 20 minutes. I wasn’t too perturbed by this – it had been another confidence-boosting win for FC Twente.
FC Twente 5 N’Kufo 9 pen, Montano 45, Sibum 60, Goncalves 68, El Ahmadi 70 Scheveningen 1 van der Laan 54
Apart from the Amstel Cup, the big talking point of the day’s matches was the only Premier Division match which was played. Feyenoord hosted Ajax and the visitors roared into a 3-0 half-time lead through Belgian striker Wesley Sonck who struck twice and skipper Rafael van der Vaart who added the third. Shinji Ono pulled a goal back for the home team in the second half, but Ajax secured an important 3-1 victory in Rotterdam.
02-12-2005, 12:19 AM
“He’s one of Holland’s brightest managerial prospects” Post #38
Second-placed Den Haag suffered a blow to their leadership aspirations in the Premier Division tonight as they fell 1-0 at home to Willem II. A late goal by Erik de Kruyk gave the Tilburgers a much needed victory.
In Europe Ajax all but ended their hopes of advancement in the Champions Cup as they fell 3-0 to Inter Milan in Italy. Vieri, Adriano and Martins all scored as the Italians displayed a vast superiority over the Dutch champions.
Wednesday 26th September 2001:
Another three matches were decided in the Premier Division tonight. Den Bosch took advantage of Den Haag’s defeat the previous evening as they won 2-0 at bottom of the table NAC. A first half brace by Brayton Biekman extended Den Bosch’s lead to 4 points over 2nd placed Den Haag and 6 points to 3rd placed PSV. A late goal by substitute Alexander Prent gave NEC a 1-0 win over de Graafschap. In Roda the home side’s Sven Vandenbroeck opened the scoring against Vitesse, but the visitors equalised late in the second half through Matthew Amoah to force a 1-1 draw.
The Champions Cup saw PSV record their first win after two losses as Gerald Sibon and Jefferson Farfan took the Eindhoven club to a 2-0 lead against Panathinaikos of Greece. Although Konstantinou pulled a goal back, PSV went to a 3-1 lead after Sibon converted a penalty which had seen keeper Chalkias sent off for hauling down Vennegoor of Hesselink in the box. The game finished 3-1 to PSV.
Thursday 27th September 2001:
The first team was pretty much at full fitness after two months of training and the Scheveningen result had raised confidence even higher, so I decided to give the players the day off as a reward for their hard work. Of course that meant a day off for me as well.
I made a few personal phone calls, catching up with some friends that I hadn’t spoken to for a while. I managed to get hold of Guido Merry, an old mate of mine, who was a former Ajax player and was now coaching with Fortuna Sittard in the First Division. We had a chat about our respective teams and I congratulated him on the fact that he and manager Chris Dekker had managed to get the Fortuna team up into second place in the First Division. I told Guido that I had a couple of VIP tickets for Holland’s home friendly with Portugal in Amsterdam in nine days time and we agreed to catch up for dinner and watch the match afterwards.
I’d hardly finished that call when my mobile phone rang. I answered and it was another mate of mine who I had been intending to call anyway. Damian Streggi was a former Maltese international who had played for Volendam for several seasons and had stayed on in Holland to coach. We’d been mates ever since we hit if off together after a Holland-Malta World Cup tie around ten years ago. Damian agreed to take the other ticket that I had to the upcoming Holland-Portugal friendly and he would met Guido and I in Amsterdam on October 6th for dinner as well.
I had a great afternoon just winding down. I took a drive up north and stopped in at a country restaurant for a fine late lunch. When I got back to my home around 4.30pm I just propped myself on a lounge chair and caught some late afternoon sun on this fine autumn day. Later that night, after a simple homemade dinner of pasta, salad and a bottle of imported Australian Shiraz, I sat in front of the television to catch up on all the day’s football news.
First up was the draw for the 2nd Round of the Amstel Cup. FC Twente was awarded a home tie with the amateur side Appingedam. I immediately thought that would give me a good chance to test out a couple of the youngsters that we had recently signed. Next up was news of the first big money transfer of the 2001/02 season in Holland so far. Defender Ruud Kras of Ajax had moved to Heerenveen for £825K on a four year deal.
Finally there was a wrap of the UEFA Cup 1st Round second leg matches that were decided tonight. Early goals by Kew Jaliens and Adil Ramzi had given AZ a 2-0 win over Elfsborg of Sweden and a 4-0 aggregate win. At the other extreme Utrecht had lost 1-0 in Germany to a Michalke goal for Aachen and had gone out 4-0 on aggregate. Heerenveen had similarly lost to supposedly weaker opposition as they fell 2-1 to Dinamo Tirana of Albania. Asllani and Xhafa scored for Dinamo and Marcel Seip got Heerenveen’s consolation goal as they lost 5-2 on aggregate. Feyenoord had the most comprehensive victory of the night as they thumped Lev Tallinn of Estonia 4-0 to complete a 4-1 aggregate victory. Dirk Kujit, Hossam Ghali, Bart Goor and Danko Lazovic scored the goals.
Friday 28th September 2001:
I had a special reason for watching the reserves play Roda tonight. Martin Hofstede would be making his debut for FC Twente and I wanted to see how the kid handled his first match against senior players after previously only ever appearing in youth level matches. Jeffrey was certainly spot on with his evaluation of Hofstede. The young lad showed no sign of nerves and he capped a MOM performance with two second half goals as the reserves won 4-2. Elbekay Bouchiba also had a fine performance as he grabbed a goal and Kim Christensen completed the scoring from our point of view. It was eerie watching Martin Hofstede in full flight during the game. He certainly did remind me of his brother Jordy from all those years ago.
The Friday night match in the Premier Division saw surprise leaders Den Bosch play host to PSV. Den Bosch’s lead was cut to three points as they suffered their first loss of the season in this game. Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink, Johann Vogel and Jefferson Farfan all scored early in the second half as PSV racked up a 3-0 win and moved into second place on the Premier Division table.
02-13-2005, 11:51 AM
“He’s one of Holland’s brightest managerial prospects” Post #39
Roda were not in good form at all and a record of 3 draws and 4 losses in their opening 7 games had already put the pressure on manager Wiljan Vloet. To be honest no-one in Vloet’s team was displaying any sort of decent form and player morale at Roda was rumoured to be at rock-bottom. Consequently my players had only to perform at the level that they had been at in recent weeks and I would be very confident of picking up the three points.
After last weekend’s excellent performance in the Amstel Cup I had the difficult task on settling on this week’s team line-up. I decided to leave the back four as it was. Jeroen Heubach would stay on the bench as Rahim continued at left-back. Despite Raymond Fafiani’s excellent performance on the left wing, Goncalves had been doing well enough in recent weeks to ensure that he still had first call on that position, so he returned to the starting eleven. With Jason Culina clearly needed in the advanced midfielder role, that left me with Johnnier Montano, Blaise N’Kufo and Guilherme Afonso to fit into the two forward slots. I had stuck with the N’Kufo/Afonso partnership earlier in the campaign, but I was now of the opinion that N’Kufo and Montano would make the better long-term pairing. That left Afonso as the odd man out and he had to make do with a place on the substitute’s bench for this week.
Steady rain greeted the players for the start of this match and that robbed the first ten minutes of any serious quality play. But as we started to adjust to the conditions, so we also started to dominate the game. Culina volleyed wide from 20 yards and N’Kufo headed over the cross bar as we started to find our touch. Sibum was the creator of the opening goal, surging through from the midfield to send a delightful cross towards the far post. N’Kufo climbed well to head it back into the middle and Cziommer was on hand to force it over the line from a couple of yards out. It was 1-0 to us after 13 minutes. Montano displayed a brilliant touch just a few minutes later when he dragged the ball back with his studs to avoid Brouwers tackle and then seemed to hit a curling shot from 18 yards in almost the same action. Roda keeper Kujovic could only watch as ball clipped the top of the cross bar and went over. After 21 minutes we lost Rahim to a sprained ankle, so Heubach came on at left-back. Roda’s Sergio tried to exploit our new defender’s freshness after 28 minutes by dribbling past Heubach, but Boschker saved his low shot well. When Sergio got past Heubach a minute later I worried that we may have a problem, but their striker Kone was wasteful with the chance that Sergio provided him and skied it high into the stands. As the first half drew to a close Goncalves twice demonstrated the new-found confidence that had seen him grab a permanent first team place. Firstly he worked his way to the bye-line to pull back a superb cross which N’Kufo wastefully headed straight into the arms of Kujovic. Secondly he threaded a precise pass into the feet of Sibum who then hit a first-time shot which Kujovic pushed away for a corner. As the half-time whistle sounded, I had to say that I was reasonably happy with the performance so far.
As the second half opened it was clear that Roda had pulled further back into their 5-3-2 formation and that they were not prepared to be adventurous at all. Combined with a sudden downpour of heavier rain, that meant the opening 20 minutes of the second half was basically wasted. However after 68 minutes I finally glimpsed the style of play that I had been trying to drill into the players since I had taken over at the start of the season. Sibum started the move deep in our half with a pass to Cziommer on the right. The German advanced and laid off a pass to Schuurman on the overlap. Just as you would have expected the right-back to swing a cross into the box, he instead dinked a pass back in front of Cziommer who had continued his run to the near post. Cziommer then chipped the ball to Montano standing on the penalty spot and he cushioned a header down for N’Kufo to volley it home from 10 yards out. It was so beautifully executed that it had me out of the dugout and standing in the rain applauding as the players celebrated their 2-0 lead. A few minutes later I decided to send on Fafiani for Goncalves and El Ahmadi for Cziommer as my two wide midfielders had run themselves into the ground in these wet conditions. A third goal would have made my day and when Zomer’s long pass in the 78th minute was flicked on by Culina for Montano, it looked like it would come. Montano moved to the right to open up the goal and he drove the ball low past Kujovic, but the shot hit the post instead. Heubach had played a much better second half and he was totally on top of Sergio now. After 81 minutes he tackled and dispossessed his Brazilian opponent and then advanced down the left wing. A one-two with El Ahmadi got Heubach into enough room to carefully consider his next move and he drilled a low cross into the feet of Montano. The Colombian carefully controlled the ball and from 15 yards he sent a sizzling left-footed drive high into the Roda net to make the score 3-0. De Tukkers were singing in the rain now and I was happy to join in with them. It had been another solid win by the team.
FC Twente 3 Cziommer 13, N’Kufo 68, Montano 81 Roda 0
In the other Premier Division matches there was a flurry of goals. Bart Goor and Dirk Kujit had Feyenoord two up in 10 minutes against NEC, but Frank Demouge quickly pulled it back to 2-1. The scoring then stopped and Feyenoord took the three points with that 2-1 win. A late strike by Danish U-21 winger Michael Krohn-Dehli gave RKC a 1-0 win over Groningen. RBC’s on-loan midfielder Jesper Hakansson came back to haunt his owners as he scored twice against Heerenveen. Robert Molenaar added a third for RBC and Stefan Selakovic made the final score 3-1 with a consolation goal. Vitesse comfortably beat bottom side NAC by 3-0 with goals by Igor Gluscevic, Bas Huntelaar and Peter van den Berg. Willem II and Utrecht played out a 1-1 draw with James Quinn scoring for the home side and Sandro Calabro replying for the visitors. Ajax had a good 2-1 win at AZ after Barry Opdam had given the Alkmaar side an early lead. Stephen Pienaar and Michael Mols replied late in the first half to put the current champions into a 2-1 lead which they held on to. The game of the day was in Doetinchem where de Graafschap and Den Haag had a highly entertaining 3-3 draw. Roy Stroeve continued his fine form when he opened the scoring for Den Haag, but Martin Reynders soon equalised for de Graafschap. Geert den Ouden restored Den Haag’s lead, only for Patrick Ax to bring things level at 2-2 just before the break. A sensational three minutes of action midway through the second half saw two goals and a red card. Den Haag skipper Tom van der Leegte put his side into the lead for the third time, only for Gary De Graef to equalise for the third time for de Graafschap. As they celebrated the goal that made it 3-3, the home side’s Ruslan Valeev pushed over the visitor’s Sjaak Polak right in front of the referee and he was immediately sent off. The home team managed to hold on with ten men to get a point from the match.
As I relaxed at home late on Saturday night I happily took in the Premier Division table at the end of September. FC Twente was currently in 4th place and 4 points off the pace of surprise league leaders Den Bosch. However due to game rescheduling because of European competitions we had two games in hand on Den Bosch. We were thus well placed to move even higher if we could pick up the points in those spare matches. PSV had ominously moved up to 2nd place and both Ajax and Feyenoord were hovering just below us, so any thought of the championship at this stage would certainly have been frivolous on my behalf.
02-16-2005, 06:00 AM
“He’s one of Holland’s brightest managerial prospects” Post #40
The ankle injury that Rahim suffered in yesterday’s match against Roda will keep him sidelined for at least three weeks. This means that Jeroen Heubach will get the chance to reclaim the left-back spot after giving it up to Rahim in the previous two matches.
Wednesday 3rd October 2001:
The office secretary had left me the usual set of daily newspaper clippings that are circulated around the senior management of the club. Amongst them I found the following report on FC Twente’s new youth signings:
Quote:
BUISSINK SIGNING IS A LINK TO THE PAST
Hidden behind the quiet revolution that has seen new FC Twente manager Peter Buissink take his side to fourth place in the Premier Division is a strategy that may bring the club even greater success in future years. Buissink and his assistant Jeffrey Kooistra have been overseeing the revamping of the FC Twente youth and reserve team setups. Their actions are ongoing and the results may not be realised for several seasons. What is clear though is that several youngsters of genuine potential have been signed up by the club in the past two months. The surname of one such talented youngster will be familiar to those older supporters of FC Twente.
Martin Hofstede is a fine prospect for the future. The 15 year old will celebrate his 16th birthday in November. Already Buissink and Kooistra have high hopes for this youngster. And here is the link – current manager Peter Buissink was a team-mate of Jordy Hofstede, Martin’s older brother, when he first rose prominence as future star with FC Twente back in the 1986/87 and 1987/88 seasons. The two youngsters were well known to be very good friends.
Whilst Buissink was going from strength to strength after making his debut as a 17 year old in September 1986, Jordy Hofstede took a little more time to develop. However by November 1987 Hofstede had also made the breakthrough to the first team as an 18 year old. There were 10 starts and 7 substitute appearances with 3 goals scored as Hofstede made his mark in the FC Twente first team. Unfortunately though, Jordy Hofstede had several personal problems. There were rumours of drug-taking and he was certainly threatened at least once with the termination of his playing contract. All of this came to a head on the night of April 6th 1988 when Hofstede took his own life by throwing himself under a train on the outskirts of Enschede. It was a tragic end to life that had so much potential, but was ended all too soon.
Now it is 2001, Peter Buissink is back at FC Twente and there is another talented youngster with the surname of Hofstede waiting in the wings. This time let us hope that the outcome is much less forlorn and that a young star continues to rise.
There was good news from the treatment room today as Karim Touzani was given the all-clear to resume full training. Touzani will do some extra over the next few days whilst the majority of the players have a full day off on Saturday due to the international break. With our next match being a week away there is a good chance that Touzani will be able to return to the starting line-up.
Friday 5th October 2001:
There was Under-21 international action today as Holland played host to Portugal at De Kuip in Rotterdam. Heerenveen’s Klaas-Jan Huntelaar scored in the 45th and 72nd minutes to take the Dutch side into a 2-0 lead before Chelsea’s Felipe Oliveira pulled a goal back for the Portuguese in the 79th minute. The score remained at 2-1 and the Dutch Under-21’s had their first win of the season.
FC Twente’s Peter Niemeyer was named as the captain of the German Under-21 team that played France in Munich, but his side fell to a 1-0 defeat in that match.
Saturday 6th October 2001:
It was great to catch up with Guido Merry and Damian Streggi in Amsterdam before the national team’s latest match. Damian was a bit of a connoisseur of good food and fine wine and he had found a delightful restaurant to eat in. Three excellent bottles of red wine were consumed and we made our way to the Amsterdam ArenA in a jovial mood. We found our way to our seats and settled in to watch the latest effort of the Dutch team.
Dutch national team manager Marco van Basten continued with his 3-5-2 formation and made only one change to the line-up which started against Spain last month. Holland certainly had the best of the opening half hour of this clash and they took the lead on 24 minutes when Davids collected a weak clearance from van Bronckhorst’s free-kick and curled over a cross which wing-back Melchiot headed home for his second goal in consecutive matches. Right on half-time Portugal spurned three glorious chances to equalise as substitute keeper Westerveld denied Pauleta with a fine save and then Paauwe twice cleared off the line from shots by Deco and Pedro Mendes. A slew of changes by both sides early in the second half did little to promote a raising of the game’s standard. Robben had the best chance to increase Holland’s lead, but his volley from 18 yards crashed against the cross bar after 58 minutes. Portugal dragged themselves back into the match and they got themselves an equaliser after 70 minutes when eventual MOM Paulo Ferreira raided down the right wing and cross for substitute Sa Pinto to head home from close range at the near post. The final 20 minutes did little in the way of achieving a wining goal for either side.
Holland 1 Melchiot 24 Portugal 1 Sa Pinto 70
van der Sar, Ooijer, Paauwe, Hofland, Melchiot, Boateng, Davids, van Bronckhorst, Seedorf, van Nistelrooy, Robben.
In news more relevant to FC Twente, both Blaise N’Kufo and Guilherme Afonso had been named on the bench for Switzerland’s home friendly with Scotland. N’Kufo had come on in the 54th minute, but Afonso stayed on the bench. The game ended in a 0-0 draw.
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