Curtain raised
AZ Alkmaar 2 - 1 FC Twente Enschede
Saturday 22 April, AFAS Stadion.
Games before cup finals seldom give up too many clues.
They tend to be nervy affairs, favouring the team not turning out on the big day. With AZ facing Vitesse in the KNVB Beker Finale on Sunday 29th April, this was looked like it was running to form, but ended up bucking the trend when in the final quarter it exploded into life and delivered a stunning own goal, a sending off, and a cracking last minute winner.
Until then it looked as if the points would be off to Enschede, Twente's youthful exuberance matched by the boisterous away support. The Tukkers were compact, purposeful and a handful on the break with the Man City trio of Unal, Yeboah, Celina and flying Finn Jensen to the fore,
AZ were organised and tidy, if short of pace, but desperately short of a final ball, cross or shot of any quality in the first half. van Overeem, and Iranian Jahanbakhsh standing out along with fitter-looking veteran Ron Vlaar who must have taken heart before the Beker Finale from shackling Unal for much of the game. Weghorst was occasionally in the game, when his team mates remembered he was there to hold the ball up if they gave it to him early enough.
It was almost half an hour in before the AZ support woke up, and Jahanbakhsh cross shot wife of the left upright on 38 was their only real first half chance of note.
For all the world looking like a 0-0 draw as the rain began to fall, the second half livened up on 64 minutes when Andersen evaded his marker at a corner and got a great connection with his head to a corner from the right from 6 yards. Henk Frazer, the Vitesse manager, was in the stands and AZ's poor defending for that goal is in his notebook.
AZ came into the game, with Jahanbakhsh blazing over from a good position on 68 after neat build up play. The goal which looked like it might arrive did so on 80 minutes, when Haps pace and trickery on the right saw him felled. The free kick was swung over and by Haps and the hapless Peet Bijen got his head in the way and nodded into his own net.
On 85 the game took its most decisive turn when Andersen was dismissed for a second bookable, and with Fred Friday on for Dabney dos Santos who had a quiet game, AZ took it by the scruff of the neck. Weghorst and Friday caused mayhem in the Twente box, with Friday almost scoring with an amazing backheel from 12 yards, and then on the stroke of 90 Jahanbakhsh played Friday in and he fired home.
John van den Brom will have taken heart from the effectiveness of his subs here - Seuntjens, Bel Hassani and Friday were all effective and AZ looked a good deal more purposeful when they came on. Weghorst showed flashes of what he can do, Haps was was handful, Jahanbakhsh had a great game although it was little mystifying when Jonas Svensson got man of the match.
FC Twente were in many ways the perfect dress rehearsal for Vitesse - there is an ot a great deal between the three of them as they sit in 5th, 6th and 7th in the Eredivisie. They will feel disappointed not to have departed with at least a point, but there is much to like about their youthful energy and if they cna hold on to their Man City loanees, as unlikly as that may be especially with the attention Unal is attracting, they will challenge for a top 6 spot again.
For AZ, on the Rotterdam. De Kuip and Vitesse await.
