Wesley Sneijder commits to Ajax until summer 2009
18 November: In recent weeks the Dutch media have almost
exclusively reported about Ajax players who will leave the club
at season's end (De Jong, Pienaar, Trabelsi, Maxwell), but
today the Amsterdam club announced that Wesley
Sneijder has signed a new contract at the Amsterdam ArenA,
thereby committing to Ajax until the summer of 2009. His
previous deal would have expired two years earlier, in
2007.
Wesley Sneijder (born Utrecht, 09 June 1984) is not a born
Amsterdammer, but has been an Ajacied for most of his life. He
joined the Amsterdam club in 1992 at age seven, entered the
Ajax youth system in the E2 youth team and came all the way
through the ranks. He signed his first real contract in 2000
and was added to the Ajax-1 squad by head-coach Ronald Koeman
during the winter break of 2002-2003.
Sneijder made his official first team début on 02
February 2003 in the Eredivisie home game against Willem II.
His first goal followed just over one month later: on 05 March
in the Dutch cup fixture against FC Groningen. So far, Wesley
Sneijder, now 21 years of age, had 116 first team appearances
for Ajax, in which he netted 30 times. On 30 April 2003 he
became the 98th Ajacied to make his début for the Dutch
national team. He currently has 20 caps (5 goals) for
Oranje.
"I have chose for Ajax," the midfielder said while the ink
on his new contract was drying. "I still feel I can learn a lot
over here and I have an Ajax heart. I won the championship with
Ajax once and I want to do that at least a few more times. This
team can still grow tremendously, so I'm staying at Ajax."
(MP)
Source: Ajax.nl
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