Cruyff, De Boer or Bergkamp. Top 5 players in the history of Ajax Amsterdam

Several legendary footballers have passed through Ajax Amsterdam in its history. Choosing the best of them can be a big task for a football fan, yet in this article we have decided to highlight five of the best footballers in Ajax’s history.

Marco van Basten

Marco van Basten is definitely not to be missed in the list. This Dutch striker spent his entire active career at Ajax and AC Milan. He showed his shooting potential especially at Ajax, where he managed to score an incredible 128 goals in 133 matches.

Van Basten’s most successful season was 1986/1987, in which he scored a total of 43 goals. In the same year, he also won the Cup Winners’ Cup with the team, which earned him a contract at AC Milan the following season.

Johan Cruyff

One of football’s greatest legends, Johan Cruyff. He is a three-time Ballon d’Or winner, even becoming European Player of the Century in 1999. Like van Basten, Cruyff was also very productive as a goalscorer, which earned him third place in the list of the top scorers in Eredivisie history.

Johan Cruyff was also very successful as a coach. He had success with Ajax, but his coaching engagement with Barcelona is more well known. Here he collected eight trophies and in addition to that he also got to represent Catalonia.

Frank de Boer

Unlike the two players mentioned above, Frank de Boer was in charge of the defensive activity. This Dutch defender played 328 competitive matches for Ajax, during which he dominated the Champions League, UEFA Cup, Super Cup and Intercontinental Cup with the team. He won his only Dutch title as Ajax coach.

After his time at Ajax, de Boer moved to Barcelona, where he continued his excellent performances. After the end of his active career, he turned to coaching, where, in addition to Ajax, he tried his hand at managing Inter Milan and the Dutch national team.

Edwin van der Sar

In the list of the best players we also have a goalkeeping representative and it has to be said, quite deservedly. Van der Sar has guarded the Ajax goal in 226 competitive matches and even has one goal scored in his statistics. But more important are the hundreds of goals van der Sar has prevented with his great saves.

Football fans may also know this goalkeeper from his time in the Premier League. He also made a big mark at Manchester United, where he was at the club’s peak. However, he managed to win the biggest trophy for the Champions League winners with both Ajax and Manchester United.

Dennis Bergkamp

The last player on the list is striker Dennis Bergkamp, who made his career at Ajax and Arsenal. While Bergkamp played significantly more games at the English club, he was much more productive at Ajax. He scored 103 goals in 185 games for the Dutch club, while at Arsenal he scored 87 goals in 11 years.

An interesting thing about Bergkamp was that he developed aerophobia, a fear of flying. Because of this phobia, he was forced to travel to all matches by train or car. Because of this, he would arrive tired for some matches or miss some duels altogether.

Source: SportMob, Aktuálně