One year on from their Champions League mauling of Rangers, managerless Ajax now prop up the Eredivisie relegation zone.
The Dutch giants have taken the decision to sack manager Maurice Steijn after only four months in charge following tense fan protests in Amsterdam.
The weekend’s 4-3 defeat away to FC Utrecht is the club’s fourth straight Eredivisie defeat with Ajax now sitting in the relegation zone after a disastrous start to the season.
Despite being far-and-away the most successful club in the Netherlands, mismanagement of the team’s finances and squad have left the much-heralded side in a dramatic pickle.
Since the exit of Erik Ten Hag to Manchester United in April last year the club has faced a staggering downturn in the face of rivals Feyenoord and PSV Eindhoven.
Having only won one game in the league this season, far from seeing their title tilt over by October Ajax are now genuinely on the verge of being pulled into a relegation battle.
Rangers Champions League foes Ajax in stunning collapse
Only 12 months ago were Rangers being humbled by the Dutch giants in Amsterdam, a 4-0 hammering in the Netherlands preceding a 3-1 home defeat at Ibrox.
In what was the worst ever Champions League group stage performance, Rangers were humiliated in a tough group which also contained Liverpool and Napoli.
But those Champions League defeats to Ajax particularly rankled as Rangers failed to put up an appropriate fight in the face of a club routinely compared with the Ibrox side.
Ajax’s business model of developing top young talents then developing them into sellable assets – before re-investing back into the squad – is the envy of sides like Rangers across Europe.
But their example stands to show that if recruitment is not on point then there is only so much that a club can rely on their own youth talents doing the business.
Whilst we suspect that Ajax will stop the rot and prevent relegation from the Eredivisie – an unthinkable scenario in Holland – the situation further highlights Rangers shortcomings in the Champions League last season.
