Valentijn Driessen has nothing good to say about the Supervisory Board at Ajax and the international accounting and consultancy organization KPMG, which investigated a possible conflict of interest of former technical director Sven Mislintat. In the eyes of the football chief of The Telegraph they all 'sacrificed' Ajax by not doing what they had to do.

“It's all from the ivory tower, in front of the stage, meaningless, manipulative, money-consuming, self-absorbed, protective and vulgar cleaning up the street,” Driessen begins his column about the commissioners Michael van Praag, Leo van Wijk, Pier Eringa, Jan van Halst, Annette Mosman, Georgette Schlick, Cees van Oevelen.

According to Driessen, they all, in combination with KPMG, victimized Ajax by not doing what they had to do. The journalist states that they failed as supervisors with regard to sporting, organizational, financial and personnel policy. “KPMG conducted an inadequate investigation, with which the company consciously helped to keep the perpetrators of the implosion at Ajax out of harm's way.”

Driessen points out that former Supervisory Board chairman Pier Eringa and the dismissed technical director Sven Mislintat were not interviewed by KPMG at all for the investigation. After the investigation was completed, Ajax announced that no one was allowed to read KPMG's report because of privacy-sensitive information.

However, Driessen cannot wrap his head around that, as everyone at Ajax benefits from transparency. “The bodies have to come out of the closet. Van Praag and Van Wijk decided differently, together with their Supervisory Board colleagues, including Danny Blind. The Supervisory Board even demanded that Managing Director Alex Kroes sign KPMG's shoddy work without access. He rightly refused.”

According to Driessen, Kroes, who was suspended by the Supervisory Board, aimed to clean up 'the completely rotten Ajax organization'. “For example, he wanted to kill financial director Susan Lenderink. She had her nose on everything, but only turned her nose up instead of digging it deep into the matter and pulling the emergency brake.”

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