Feyenoord 0-1 Ajax: Van Rhijn strike seals win for champions

Last season's Eredivisie winners took all three points in Rotterdam despite being dominated by their hosts throughout much of the match


Champions Ajax stole all three points against rivals Feyenoord in Rotterdam on Sunday, a game where the hosts dominated every statistic other than the one that mattered, in goals scored.

Fred Rutten’s team enjoyed 63% of possession in this contest, as well as having 16 attempts on goal.

But they found Dutch World Cup ‘keeper Jasper Cillessen in unbeatable form, while a single goal by Ricardo van Rhijn ultimately gave Ajax victory, one which takes them up to second spot and three points behind leaders PSV.

Only once in the previous 116 Eredivisie between these two sides has there been a goalless draw and after the opening exchanges there appeared little likelihood of that statistic changing.

Feyenoord took the game to the title holders and were unlucky not to take the lead after just 60 seconds when Jean-Paul Boetius fed captain Jordy Clasie inside the Ajax box, but his left-foot effort cannoned off the crossbar with Cillessen beaten.

Three minutes later, Feyenoord attacked down the opposite flank but again, to the frustration of the home bench and fans, the outcome was identical.

Australian Luke Wilkshire centred from the right, his cross arriving on the head of Ruben Schaken, but his powerful attempt smashed against the bar with Cillessen again a mere spectator.

After the poor start they had made to the season, these were encouraging signs from last season’s Eredivisie runners-up, but completely against the flow of play, Ajax took a shock lead.

Feyenoord conceded a free-kick 30 metres out which full-back Ricardo van Rhijn struck beautifully, right-footed, the ball swinging beyond the static Kenneth Vermeer.

The hosts looked bewildered at such a turnaround if fortunes, but there was little in the way of luck going Feyenoord’s way. If anything, their pain was compounded when in the 10th minute Miguel Nelom crossed from the left to the far post where central defender Sven van Beek sent his deliberate header rebounding off the frame of the goal for a third time.

Ajax, apart from their goal, had seen little of the ball as Feyenoord pressed, and Colin Kazim-Richards had Cillessen scrambling across his goal with a speculative shot - with the outside of his right boot - from distance.

Frank de Boer’s men did manage to relieve the pressure occasionally and on one forward raid Vermeer was forced into a good save, high to his left, as Anwar El Ghazi tried to double the visitors advantage.

From the resulting corner, Kolbeinn Sigthorsson glanced a header across the face of the Feyenoord goal.

However, Feyenoord continued to take the game to Ajax, and Kazim-Richards was guilty of a dreadful miss minutes before the interval.

Picked out by Jens Toornstra’s through pass, Kazim-Richards controlled and cut inside Niklas Moisander in one movement off his right boot, but then dragged his left-foot shot wide of the Ajax goal. It was a costly miss, given how much Feyenoord had put into the first period.

Early in the second half, Vermeer made a good stop to deny Sigthorsson from a tight angle, but that was nothing to the crucial save at the other end from Cillessen.

Seventeen minutes from time, Wilkshire’s free kick was met by Boetius, his header frocing Cillessen to change direction, clawing the ball out with his left hand.

Feyenoord continued to press right into stoppage time, and substitute Mitchell te Vrede was twice denied in quick succession, firstly when his shot was blocked on the line after a good run from Manu, then by the in-form Cillessen who tipped te Vrede’s header over from under the bar.