Nieuwe Revu

The following is a translation of a feature article that ran in the May 2001 issue of Nieuwe Revu, a Dutch-language weekly published throughout Holland. The story is written -- and translated to English here -- by our Editor, Menno Pot.

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Ajax USA: 'Bless ya Danny!'

A pilgrimage to the ArenA with American Ajax fans

For a long, a very long time, Ajax's club structure did not seem to be designed for attention from abroad. Ajax USA -- a club of over 1400 hardcore Ajax fans from the U.S., Canada, England and the rest of the world and a possible entrance for Ajax to the largest unexplored football market in the world -- was ignored by the club they tried to support. Until now. Reporter Menno Pot went to the ArenA with Ajax USA and reaped the first fruits of what seems to be a new philosophy. "They're rolling out the red carpet for us!"

By Menno Pot
Photography: Martijn van de Griendt

Friday night, 27 April 2001. Ajax are playing NAC Breda at home, in the Amsterdam ArenA. A dull 0-0 draw seems inevitable. Frankly, it's an appallingly boring shit game for the supporters, except for a little group in the far corner of the main stand, behind a red banner saying 'AJAX USA'. To them this is not an appallingly boring shit game, but the apotheosis of a week-long Ajax vacation. Perhaps the highlight of their year, in fact. As Daniel Cruz luckily fumbles the ball past NAC goalie Gabor Babos in the 79th minute Ben Bell (from Media, Pennsylvania) almost gets a heart-attack of joy. Nothing could have spoiled his night anyway: the stadium speaker wished him a happy 40th birthday. On his thigh is a tattoo of the Ajax logo, the size of a frozen pizza. One day he wants to propose to his beloved on the stands of the ArenA, he says. "I've already got the location. All I need now is a woman."

Some hundred yards away from them, behind the South goal, I cheer for the three points, but especially for the group of Ajax USA'ers. Two years ago I co-incidentally surfed by the website: ajax-usa.com. I found it fascinating, this small, cheeky, but unpretentious group of footy fans from a country that hardly understands soccer in the first place. They fell in love with a club from a small country. A club that does not have an international public relations apparatus, like Manchester United. The American Ajacieden distinguish themselves by their sometimes obsessive interest in the youth system, which many Americans seem to find at least as interesting as the first team. Ajax USA, a website free of advertising and with no official affiliation with Ajax, is what connects them.

I offered founder and webmaster Jim McGough from California my services, volunteering to write news and match reports for Ajax USA. Shortly after that he officially made me a 'staff member'. And now we're at the ArenA, on our very first self-organized trip to 'Ajax paradise', as Jim calls it. Ben Bell refers to the ArenA pitch as 'holy grass'. Other than that he really knows everything about Ajax.

Since Ajax USA was founded in January 1995 the membership fluctuates around 1400. Half of them are from the United States and Canada. Some 300 Dutchmen subscribed and approximately one hundred Brits. The remaining 300 live in the huge country that Americans refer to as 'ROW': Rest Of World. From China to Sweden and from the Phillippines to Nigeria.

The attendees on our inaugural trip to The Netherlands are from all over the North-American continent. Bob Zylstra from Florida and Peter Hassebroek from Toronto (yes, they both have Dutch ancestors) are watching their club in action for the very first time in their lives. Dave McCroskey and his girlfriend Linda Schab, both from Seattle, saw Ajax play in New Jersey in 1999 but had never been to Europe before. Jim, who lives in the Californian Bay Area, flew over to Amsterdam twice to see Ajax play at De Meer. Ben Bell is the rea fanatic: he wants to make it to the ArenA at least once a year, he says. Raymond Ngiau from new Jersey has seen it all before too. No matter how many dollars they invested in this trip, one thing we could not guarantee them was a win for Ajax. Daniel Cruz has just done the only remaining thing to make their week a success: he secured the three points for Ajax-1. Shit game or not: finally a delegation of Ajax USA member could cheer. Together. For Ajax.

It's the crowning glory of a week in which Ajax -- under supervision of new PR manager Simone Freling -- gave Ajax USA a remarkably warm welcome. On Monday morning, our first day at the ArenA, the entire coaching staff walked by to shake hands with us and then invited us onto the training pitch to watch the first team's morning session. One of the coaches wore a pair of goalkeeper's gloves. "Hey, that's Will Coort, the goalkeepers' coach", says Ben. I'm sure he was right. Ajax's Jack-of-all-trades, Sjakie Wolfs, seems to find it completely normal that a group of Americans knows him.
"Hi Sjakie", says Jim.
"So, do you boys exercise a bit at home?" Sjakie asks in Dutch. "As far as I can see: not really, eh?"

After training coach Co Adriaanse beckons us onto the pitch to take group pictures with the players. We are the only visitors to the ArenA allowed to go on the pitch inside the ArenA. We get free admission to the Ajax Museum and receive a special discount at the Ajax Fanshop. At the shop, by the way, a remarkable characteristic of the average Ajax USA'er manifests itself: in the U.S. football does not seem to be a "people's game", like it is here. In America it's slightly sophisticated, almost. Watching soccer is popular amongst students and former students: highly educated and relatively wealthy people in most cases. The result: our group is relatively small but the attendees have a lot of dollars to spend.

"Jesus, they're rolling out the red carpet for us!" says Peter, usually such an ironic guy. He carries an armful of shirts towards the counter. "They treat us like kings!" exclaims Ben, the man of Yank superlatives. He spends over 500 guilders on merchandise. Jim, organizer of the trip, is relieved, more than anything else.

For many years the average Ajax supporter was wondering if the club he once fell in love with still existed. The new crop of Ajax officials, however, especially Simone Freling, seems to be different than the folks who have represented Ajax over the past few years. They're still business-like, but seem sincere and hospitable.

Frankly, it was about time that something changed. For years and years Ajax's way of acting towards foreign fans was almost a policy of discouragement. The tragic low-point occurred during the Gotham Cup Tournament in the New York area (1999). American television had not televised an Ajax game in years and Ajax had just experienced one of the worst seasons in modern history. Nevertheless, Jim McGough easily mobilized 150 Ajax USA'ers, many of whom flew over from the west coast to see Ajax play two dreadful games. Ajax USA sold over 250 tickets to supporters who had flown across an entire continent for their Ajax. That's quite special, you'd say, but the Ajax USA group was totally and painfully ignored by the Amsterdam delegation. Photo-shoots and autographing sessions with the players were promised, but nothing happened.

In the mean time Dutch fans grumbled that Ajax was no longer a warm, human club, but had become too much of a cold, commercial enterprise. The truth was even worse: Ajax did not feel like a warm club anymore but also failed completely as a commercial enterprise. A commercial enterprise would at least have made sure that there plenty of merchandise was available at the Gotham Cup games. An Ajax merchandise booth outside of the stadiums in New York and New Jersey would have been looted to the very last Ajax lighter by the Ajax USA group, hungry as they were for practically everything that had 'Ajax' printed on it. But no: the Americans had the choice between two ugly Ajax T-shirts, brought along from Amsterdam in very, very limited numbers. "It seemed like Ajax did not even want to make money", says Dave from Seattle.

It's only one example of the remarkable 'policy' of Ajax of recent years: with an almost admirable persistency the club ignored the dawning interest from the largest unexplored football market on the planet.

Soccer is now the biggest youth sport in the United States. In about ten years from now an entire generation of American young men will understand and perhaps even like the game, and start searching for a great club to support. They may want to buy jerseys, T-shirts and scarfs of that club. Young American kids play soccer and Ajax Amsterdam happens to have the reputation in the U.S. of being the soccer club with the best youth development academy in the world. If Ajax would realize that they could open up a fan reservoir of a size that can hardly be overestimated - and mind you: we're only talking about the U.S. as a consumer's market here, not even about the scouting potential.

Ajax - how typical - are doing absolutely nothing so far and will probably continue to plod on in Ghana and South-Africa until Manchester United, Real Madrid and AC Milan have sold ten million jerseys each in the U.S. And then, of course, Ajax will complain again in special UEFA committees that clubs from small countries can't keep up with the big ones - and that the financial gap between the roch and the poor is getting wider and wider.

When foreign Ajax fans share their experiences with you every week you develop a different view on the frequently heard claim that Ajax have become a 'business'. I wish it were true, I would say, based on the past few seasons. Many of my attempts to help American Ajax fans - even this season - seemed to completely jam up Ajax's club structure, which is absolutely not designed for attention from abroad. Arrogance, was my initial thought, but now I know better: it's clumsiness. Ignorance rather than unwillingness. A random example: a Canadian fan tried to order a jersey twice from the online fanshop on Ajax.nl. He never received anything. He called Ajax Direct, Ajax's international mailorder phone number, but got to listen to a voice mail message in Dutch: Ajax Direct was closed for Christmas. This was in early May. I kid you not.

One more example: a supporter from Finland sent email to Ajax's customer support desk, asking them how he could obtain tickets from abroad. He received a reply which was incomplete, incomprehensible and... in Dutch. Quite an achievement: screwing up in three different ways. 'Without a Club Card you can not buy tickets for this game', the message said. No explanation about the pretty illogical Club Card system we have in Holland, no alternative suggestions, nothing. It's very typical that Ajax were apparently unable (or unwilling to take the time) to explain that it is quite easy to buy a 'temporary' Club Card and a ticket in one transaction, until the day before the game at the fan desk near the main entrance -- and that only one home game a year is sold-out.

Can't that information be found on the official club website, you wonder? No. On the English version of Ajax.nl is the question "How can I buy tickets from abroad?" Click on it, if you like a good laugh. Believe it or not, but here's the answer you get to read: 'Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat'. Etcetera. Is it Latin? You tell me. The point is that Ajax don't seem to realize that it's better to have no English website at all for a few months and then launch a good one, than having one that's six months behind and contains ticket information in Teletubbie language.

I patiently wrote two polite e-mails about this to Ajax at the start of last season. No reply. After a while I gave up. Last year I was so naive to carefully ask to the lady at customer support if the web editor had fallen asleep with his head on his keyboard while writing the English ticket info. "I am not discussing the content of our website with supporters", she interrupted me, halfway my first sentence.

They've found a new web editor now. She's working on a new Ajax website in English, apparently. Enthusiastic, studious girl. The club will probably be okay. For starters, they showed their warmest and most human side during Ajax USA's 'Ajax In April' trip. As a supporter I've been proud of Ajax's play a few times this season. Finally, Ajax have given me a few me reasons to be proud of Ajax-as-a-club again.

It's the evening after the Ajax vs NAC game. We're at De Toekomst, home of the Ajax youth. American Ajax player John O'Brien makes his comeback in the Ajax reserves team, much to the Americans' joy. He even scores a goal, firing a free kick into the net against De Graafschap. After the game John joins us for a drink. Joey Didulica, Ajax's Australian goalkeeper, joins us, too. As if our group wasn't excited enough already: Johan Cruyff, Bobby Haarms, Co Adriaanse and Leo Beenhakker are walking around at De Toekomst. An AT5 camera team asks Ben Bell if he's already introduced himself to Cruyff. "No," answers Ben. "Unfortunately I haven't talked to God just yet." Later that evening he does bump into his idol, Danny Blind, and has his picture taken wit him. "Bless ya, Danny."

Ben has two things that most American footy fans don't have: feelings of extreme rivalry and a sort of scornful Amsterdam football wit. He refers to Feyenoord as 'F-Word'. When Fox Sports World showed Fortuna vs Ajax earlier in the season he thought the Limburg side were so poor that he's been calling them 'Dead tuna' ever since.

Finally, Ajax have seen with their own eyes how easy it is to give a small group of loyal American Ajax fans the week of their lives. It took them a few years, but the club actually seem to realize now that a human approach is the best option, not only morally but also commercially. Should a football club be a club or an enterprise? The good news is that you don't have to choose. The two are not mutually exclusive. A real club is both. Eureka!