Wesley Sneijder is still of the opinion that Ajax paid a much too high transfer fee for Calvin Bassey. The central defender has been praised for his performance against NCbut the former Ajax player does not immediately go along with that mood.
“He can defend it,” Sneijder notes in the broadcast of Veronica Offside. Still, he believes that Ajax has dug too deep into its pockets to bring in Bassey. ‘I still think 23 million is way too much. He plays at Ajax, so he will have to be able to play football. He might be great for another league, but if you keep getting released and you have to play from the back, he’s struggling.’
“He has to find a middle ground in handing in the balls a little faster,” says Sneijder, who does not see it as a weakness. According to him, a player should know his own strengths and weaknesses. ‘That is also a quality, if you realize that you have to hand it in quickly, otherwise things can go wrong.’
Fellow analyst Andy van der Meijde agrees with Sneijder. He sees specific qualities in Bassey, but as soon as the ball is in possession of Ajax, it is a bit disappointing. “One-on-one he is very good because he is fast and strong. If you build up, he will give wrong balls. He must hand over the ball to the player standing next to him, then that person must take care of the set-up.’
Ajax-NEC
Incidentally, the former attacker of Ajax was not happy with the field game of the team from Amsterdam against NEC. ‘How bad’, is his first reaction. “It was reasonable for 20, 25 minutes, but it was not dominant. Later in the second half they just played the ball back, because they were afraid of the rest of the defense. But NEC could not have achieved more.’