Ajax edge past Almere City to go eight points clear at the top of the Eredivisie

Ajax increased their lead at the top of the Eredivisie on Sunday. The league leaders beat Almere City 0-1 to get their ninth league win in a row. They now have an eight-point lead on nearest challengers PSV, who have not won in their last seven league games.

It now seems likely that Ajax will be able to celebrate their 37th league win on the club’s 125th anniversary. Despite the positive situation, Ajax’s performance against Almere was nothing to write home about. Ajax still face PSV, FC Utrecht, AZ, and FC Twente.

Kenneth Taylor shot Ajax into the lead in the eighth minute. However, Ajax surprisingly let the lowest-ranked team in the Eredivisie dominate possession after this. Almere struggled to break down the well-organized Ajax team.

The home team did not get closer to a goal than a long-distance shot from Junior Kadile in the first half. Mika Godts failed to double Ajax’s lead shortly after this attempt.

Ajax was missing Josip Sutalo, Wout Weghorst, Youri Regeer, Christian Rasmussen, and Owen Wijndal to injury. Matheus was playing in goal for the visitors once again, giving Remko Pasveer another game to recover from his back injury.

Almere came close to an equalizer in the opening phase of the second half when Matheus had run out of his goal, and Kornelius Hansen’s lob hit the crossbar. James Lawrence blocked a Steven Berghuis effort from finding the net shortly after this.

Ajax manager Francesco Farioli brought on Jordan Henderson in the closing stages to add a body to the midfield. This turned out to be enough to achieve another game without conceding for the Amsterdammers. Ajax’s goalkeepers have only conceded two goals in their last nine wins in the league.