This was in keeping with Ajax’s long-standing, forward-thinking goalkeeping approach introduced by Cruyff during his playing days, and when Cruyff was appointed Ajax manager in 1985, the athletic, speedy Menzo was promoted from back-up to succeed Hans Galjé as Ajax’s number 1. Menzo became renowned for his aggressive starting position and his excellent long throws, and was consistently showered with praise by Cruyff, who said he was Ajax’s most important player in the 1987 Cup Winners’ Cup because of his distribution. Menzo could play as an outfielder, Cruyff believed.
While Cruyff was stereotypically opinionated regarding the role of the goalkeeper, he also appreciated the requirement for a genuine specialist, and appointed the Netherlands’ first-ever goalkeeping coach, Frans Hoek, the most influential of the modern era. While also running a shop in the outskirts of Amsterdam that solely stocked goalkeeping paraphernalia, Hoek’s first pupil was Menzo, and the pair continued working together throughout the late 1980s and into Van Gaal’s reign as Ajax manager. The problem, however, was that Menzo was somewhat erratic in a traditional goalkeeping sense. The stubborn ideologist Cruyff was entirely forgiving of mistakes, declaring that Menzo’s footballing ability compensated for sporadic errors, but Van Gaal was more pragmatic. The final straw came when Ajax’s UEFA Cup defence was surprisingly ended by Auxerre in March 1993, with Menzo making a dreadful mistake, palming Pascal Vahirua’s inswinging corner into his own net. Van Gaal dropped Menzo and turned to Ajax’s back-up, the previously little-known Edwin van der Sar.
Van der Sar shared Menzo’s initial footballing experience – he originally played in defence, but when his youth team’s regular goalkeeper failed to turn up for a game, Van der Sar was handed the gloves purely because he was the tallest player in the side; he eventually grew to be 1.97 metres tall, enormous even by the standards of the Netherlands, the loftiest nation in the world. His early outfield experience ensured he became a significant goalkeeping revolutionary, as he adapted instinctively to the 1992 law changes. ‘The back-pass law changed my life, because I was already good with my feet,’ he recalled after his retirement.
‘We looked at what qualities an Ajax keeper should have, and Edwin already had most of them,’ said goalkeeping coach Hoek. ‘He had a good understanding of space around his goal and could play out to the defenders. That was difficult for many keepers, because most of them were “line-keepers” who stayed on their line and were primarily ball-stoppers. Also, he was tall and therefore had enormous range. He was calm, stable and a great foundation to build plays from. And importantly, he was ambitious and very coachable.’ As Jonathan Wilson outlines in his history of the goalkeeper, The Outsider, Van der Sar was ‘the first goalkeeper to operate as a genuine sweeper’.
That might surprise those who only witnessed the end of Van der Sar’s career, which continued into his 40s – by which point he’d split eight league titles and two Champions League successes between Ajax and Manchester United, and won a then-record 130 caps. Towards the end of his career, Van der Sar was less mobile and more of a classic goalkeeper; his brief, unhappy spell with Juventus saw him being encouraged to remain on his goal line, and at Manchester United he was also more conservative. But the early Ajax-era Van der Sar was renowned for his bravery and confidence in terms of positioning and distribution, and he became the obvious and outstanding role model for the following generation of goalkeepers. Indeed, Van der Sar was so influential that what was considered remarkable in his Ajax days became entirely commonplace by the time of his retirement.
‘One of the first to bring a new perspective was Edwin van der Sar, who played a lot with his feet and allowed the position to enter a new phase,’ Germany’s World Cup-winning goalkeeper Manuel Neuer later declared. ‘I was inspired by his style of play and enjoyed the philosophy of Ajax.’ Thibaut Courtois, David de Gea and Vincent Enyeama also cite him as a major inspiration. Of course, others attempted to play as a sweeper; at the 1990 World Cup, Colombia’s extravagant René Higuita was famously dispossessed well outside his area by Roger Milla, who converted into an empty net. But such goalkeepers were considered crazy, with Higuita, most notorious for his scorpion kick, famously nicknamed ‘El Loco’.
But Van der Sar wasn’t in any way loco. Van der Sar was boring, efficient and business-like. When he retired from playing, he didn’t choose coaching or punditry, but instead became Ajax’s CEO. When approached about writing an autobiography, he was worried he wouldn’t have enough material to fill the pages. ‘I’m sorry, I’m just not very rock and roll,’ he insisted. But his understated calmness was perfect for promoting the role of the ‘footballing goalkeeper’, demonstrating it was a logical, valuable undertaking rather than a self-indulgent experiment. When constructing passing moves, Ajax used their goalkeeper considerably more than other top-level European sides, because few teams were so committed to building from the back. A back pass to the goalkeeper was widely considered a last resort, especially as the goalkeeper would simply thump the ball downfield. But Ajax’s outfielders treated Van der Sar as one of their own, safe in the knowledge he would recycle possession.
Van der Sar was certainly better than his predecessor Menzo in a traditional goalkeeping sense, but he didn’t make many spectacular saves when compared with, for example, Peter Schmeichel or David de Gea, Manchester United’s other two most celebrated goalkeepers of the Premier League era. Van der Sar once explained his duty very simply as ‘stopping the balls that people expect you to save’. His only indulgence was taking a couple of penalties when Ajax were thrashing Eredivisie minnows – he had one saved against Sparta Rotterdam, then converted another against De Graafschap, although he was annoyed to subsequently lose his clean sheet in the final minute, making the score 8–1.
Van der Sar’s most impressive piece of ‘footballing’ skill came at the start of a famous goal Ajax scored away at MVV Maastricht in May 1995, shortly before their Champions League triumph. Defender Michael Reiziger found himself under pressure in the right-back zone, and his underhit back pass meant Van der Sar had to sprint laterally out of his goal, almost on the byline, to reach the ball. The accepted practice for goalkeepers in this situation is simple: smash the ball into the stands, shout obscenities at the appropriate defender and sprint back furiously towards goal. But not Van der Sar. Instead, he nipped in ahead of the opposition striker, sidestepping the challenge and playing a calm return pass to Reiziger, now beside the corner flag. What happened next demonstrated the importance of the goalkeeper’s coolness.
Reiziger dribbled past an opponent and passed forward to Litmanen, who fed Ronald de Boer. He evaded a tackle and passed left to Edgar Davids, who also slalomed past an opponent before knocking a through-ball into the path of the onrushing defender Danny Blind, who charged through on goal in the inside-right position, then knocked a square pass for left-winger Marc Overmars to convert at the far post. It was a remarkable team goal, the single greatest summary of Ajax’s footballing style under Van Gaal, and it all started with the composure of Van der Sar. Ajax’s attackers rushed to celebrate – but not with the goalscorer Overmars, who looked confused by the lack of teammates around him and awkwardly turned to hail the supporters on his own, but instead with the defensive section of the side, because they’d built the move from deep. A delighted Van Gaal emerged from his dugout with enthusiastic applause for a wonderful team goal. This was Ajax all over: forwards dropping deep, defenders running through on goal, rapid passing and, more than anything else, a footballing goalkeeper.
When Ajax won the