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Ajax star De Ligt wins Golden Boy award


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The teenager claimed the Tuttosport award after receiving the most votes from an international panel
 

Ajax star Matthijs de Ligt has been crowned the 2018 Golden Boy as the most promising Under-21 player in Europe.

Linked with La Liga champions Barcelona and Premier League titleholders Manchester City among others, the 19-year-old centre-back claimed the Tuttosport award after receiving the most votes from an international panel.

De Ligt beat compatriot and Roma winger Justin Kluivert, Liverpool's Trent Alexander-Arnold, AC Milan forward Patrick Cutrone and Real Madrid teenager Vinicius Junior to the honour, which was won by Paris Saint-Germain star Kylian Mbappe last year.

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@Panna King

This is the information I've managed to ascertain from the sources I tend to trust and then combined their opinions into this personal one from me which is short.  Tell me if I'm right and if these are the soundbites being echoed in the Netherlands...

FC Barcelona want both De Ligt and De Jong... That's no secret and they've apparently been following them since they were boys playing in the youth systems at Ajax.  Infact Barça apparently tried to bring them both to La Masia some years back but due to the great relationship both Ajax and Barcelona have, Barça respected the decision that Ajax wanted to bring them through the ranks not only for the club itself, but also because the Dutch national team was seen as a problem even back then.

To move on...

Both Barça and Ajax have been in constant contact with each other for a number of years where these two players are concerned where both players have even been invited on several occasions to train with the Barcelona first team with three or four other promising young Ajax players.

Marc Overmars himself has been in Barcelona a number of times over Novermber and December taking to Barcelona directors on the possibility of striking a deal between Barcelona and Ajax.  Barça know and understand that they are now not alone in the attempt to acquire the services of both these extremely talented young players.

Both players are dying to go to Barcelona if they must move from Ajax but they also both understand that a lot of this is out of their own hands as their agents are the ones negotiating.  With De Jong there is apparently no problem and that a deal with both his agent and Ajax could be struck in a matter of a couple of days, but the problem lies with De Ligt who has apparently stated that he is willing to accept lower wages at the start with Barcelona but that his agent is none other than Mino Raiola... Raiola knows of De Ligt's personal wishes, but the salaries being offered by other European clubs and the agent's cut in the deal is something Barcelona don't want to get involved in and which is why they took themselves out of the running to sign Paul Pogba when he eventually moved to Manchester United (we all know how well that one went).

So... In summary...  Both players want to go to Barcelona and with De Jong it looks like an easy deal to complete but with De Ligt having Raiola as agent, Barça are hesitant to go beyond negotiating with Ajax themselves with him.  Apparently De Ligt himself and Ajax are trying to sort this out with his agent but nothing has moved on from there.

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8 minutes ago, Cicero said:

Great relationship? What exactly do Ajax get out of Barca picking off their youngsters? 

I think it goes back to the 60s where Barcelona would send their youth players to Ajax for the summer and vice versa. Plus the obvious football ethos relationship.

To be honest, on the signing their players, even though Barça have anrich history with Dutch footballers, they’re not one of the clubs that have predominantly raped their squads from players. 

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1 minute ago, SirBalon said:

I think it goes back to the 60s where Barcelona would send their youth players to Ajax for the summer and vice versa. Plus the obvious football ethos relationship.

To be honest, on the signing their players, even though Barça have anrich history with Dutch footballers, they’re not one of the clubs that have predominantly raped their squads from players. 

It's just odd hearing the term 'great relationship' when Barca are just one of many clubs that pick off Ajax's youth products, to which has seen such a big club as Ajax be downgraded to obscurity on the European stage of Modern football. 

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 19/12/2018 at 09:33, SirBalon said:

@Panna King

This is the information I've managed to ascertain from the sources I tend to trust and then combined their opinions into this personal one from me which is short.  Tell me if I'm right and if these are the soundbites being echoed in the Netherlands...

FC Barcelona want both De Ligt and De Jong... That's no secret and they've apparently been following them since they were boys playing in the youth systems at Ajax.  Infact Barça apparently tried to bring them both to La Masia some years back but due to the great relationship both Ajax and Barcelona have, Barça respected the decision that Ajax wanted to bring them through the ranks not only for the club itself, but also because the Dutch national team was seen as a problem even back then.

To move on...

Both Barça and Ajax have been in constant contact with each other for a number of years where these two players are concerned where both players have even been invited on several occasions to train with the Barcelona first team with three or four other promising young Ajax players.

Marc Overmars himself has been in Barcelona a number of times over Novermber and December taking to Barcelona directors on the possibility of striking a deal between Barcelona and Ajax.  Barça know and understand that they are now not alone in the attempt to acquire the services of both these extremely talented young players.

Both players are dying to go to Barcelona if they must move from Ajax but they also both understand that a lot of this is out of their own hands as their agents are the ones negotiating.  With De Jong there is apparently no problem and that a deal with both his agent and Ajax could be struck in a matter of a couple of days, but the problem lies with De Ligt who has apparently stated that he is willing to accept lower wages at the start with Barcelona but that his agent is none other than Mino Raiola... Raiola knows of De Ligt's personal wishes, but the salaries being offered by other European clubs and the agent's cut in the deal is something Barcelona don't want to get involved in and which is why they took themselves out of the running to sign Paul Pogba when he eventually moved to Manchester United (we all know how well that one went).

So... In summary...  Both players want to go to Barcelona and with De Jong it looks like an easy deal to complete but with De Ligt having Raiola as agent, Barça are hesitant to go beyond negotiating with Ajax themselves with him.  Apparently De Ligt himself and Ajax are trying to sort this out with his agent but nothing has moved on from there.

de Ligt will end up in Italy, his agent only engineers moves from The Netherlands to Italy, due to his relationship between both countries, plus he also gets a large finders fee from Italian clubs from his contacts at Juventus.    Raiola has tried to get de Ligt to visit turin during the winter break but de Ligt has refused to do anything about moving until the summer, due to his commitments with Ajax.   de Ligt seems a very professional player at his age but has the wrong agent to go with his image, he needs to lose Raiola for the long term of his career as Raiola is only in it for himself.   

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On 19/12/2018 at 17:00, SirBalon said:

I think it goes back to the 60s where Barcelona would send their youth players to Ajax for the summer and vice versa. Plus the obvious football ethos relationship.

To be honest, on the signing their players, even though Barça have anrich history with Dutch footballers, they’re not one of the clubs that have predominantly raped their squads from players. 

Barcelona seem to wait for players to be developed when they have bought from The Netherlands, there are no real Dutch players in their youth teams apart from Xavi Simons and Shane Kluivert but that is because of their parents living in Spain, unlike the other big clubs around europe who just get any promising Dutch player for their youths. 

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On 19/12/2018 at 16:49, Cicero said:

Great relationship? What exactly do Ajax get out of Barca picking off their youngsters? 

It has been more a 1 way relationship in the past, with managers going to Barcelona and players.  I think the relationship thing has been mistranslated though, it's more of the model of Ajax has been copied by Barcelona, the roots of their style and the way the club is run comes has been copied from Ajax.

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  • 2 weeks later...
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How far into his United career did he win it? I know he was class for Porto but was a class case of not stepping up to the big leagues. 

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