Friday, April 9, 2021 at 7:26 AM• Last update: 07:34

Ajax suffered a painful 1-2 defeat on Thursday evening in the first meeting with AS Roma in the quarter finals of the Europa League. On the way to next Thursday’s return at the Stadio Olimpico, Erik ten Hag would do well, according to Valentijn Driessen, to present his team with a motivating video. The chief football from The Telegraph believes that the Ajax selection can draw hope from the double confrontation with Real Madrid in the 2018/19 season.

Ajax then took on in the eighth finals of the Champions League the Royal. In their own Johan Cruijff ArenA, the team from Amsterdam lost 1-2, just like against AS Roma. The return was won in a historic way with 1-4, whereby Ajax qualified for the quarter finals of the billions ball. “Trainers love motivational videos. It is not difficult for Ten Hag to choose in this case, ”says Driessen.

Real Madrid was set aside with impressive numbers by goals from Hakim Ziyech, David Neres, Dusan Tadic and Lasse Schöne. “Ten Hag can always hire Tadic for accompanying commentary on the images. Or better, he has to call in the Serbian, because of yesterday’s starting eleven the captain was the only remaining basic player together with Neres and Tagliafico ”, said Driessen. “That’s the crux because that team in Madrid, with Frenkie de Jong and Matthijs de Ligt, among others, still had so much quality that it also reached the semi-finals and, within a few seconds, even the final of the Champions League.”

“Hope is always allowed and after the ‘Miracle of Madrid’ in 2019 it must now become the ‘Remontada of Rome’ for the Ten Hag team”, continues Driessen, who does not consider it very realistic that Ajax will still qualify for the semi-final. of the Europa League. He states that the absence of André Onana, Daley Blind, Sébastien Haller, Noussair Mazraoui and Maarten Stekelenburg turned out to be no longer possible on Thursday evening. He is not very hopeful for the return. “Certainly with the knowledge that perhaps only Stekelenburg and Mazraoui will come back from injuries, but the guns Blind and Onana will not and the so far disappointing Haller will also be unavailable.”