The talents of AZ wrote history this week by bringing the Youth League to the Netherlands for the first time. After wins against, among others, Barcelona, Real Madrid and Sporting Portugal, national and international eyes are focused on the latest crop of gems. Technical director Max Huiberts and head of youth academy Paul Brandenburg try to talk to the NOS explain the success.
According to Huiberts, the move to the brand new training complex in Wijdewormer has contributed to making it a lot more pleasant for the players. “In the past, the players had to sit in a van for half an hour, forty-five minutes,” said the technical man. “That has now become considerably less, boys live in the vicinity of our training complex. This gives you extra time to train more and to pay attention to your players. That is an advantage.”
“Seventy percent of our players come from the Amsterdam area,” Huiberts continues. Brandenburg mentions another advantage of the move. “Players used to sometimes choose another club, because AZ was quite a distance away. We moved closer to our children and that gave a boost.” The new training complex is about twenty minutes from Amsterdam. In the past that was more than forty kilometers.
According to Huiberts, there are no major secrets to the success. “Make sure you bring many talented people together, with a good program and good facilities. We have been doing that well for years, I think. And stick to your vision, regardless of periods of setbacks or success. Whether they are jealous of Ajax AZ? I find it difficult to say something about that, because I am not aware of the program they run there. I do know that good players also play and good people are walking around. “