Geelen can do nothing with the image that has emerged around Ajax director Cruyff

Menno Geelen has dismissed claims that Jordi Cruijff is working alone at Ajax. Het Parool recently reported that, but the chief executive insists the rumours are nonsense.

"I do not recognise that picture at all," Geelen says in an extensive interview with De Telegraaf. "Jordi is actually a team player. I have personally spoken to him virtually every day over the past few months, about all sorts of matters."

Geelen says Cruijff regularly consults other Ajax board members as well. "Jordi also consults a lot with our finance director Shashi Baboeram Panday. And he involves Daniel de Ridder and Siem de Jong, who are developing as technical managers."

He continues: "They liaise just as easily with the scouting team and the football side as with the administrative side of the club. Jordi also exchanges ideas a lot with the head coach, other members of the staff, and with the football commissioner."

Cruijff has already brought a significant number of players to Ajax, prompting comparisons in some quarters with Sven Mislintat. The former technical director spent millions on new players in 2023, and many of them failed to perform in Amsterdam.

"The criticism and questions were understandable at the time," Geelen says, acknowledging that the transfer policy back then was far from ideal. "The Mislintat period was evaluated extensively, including externally. Among other things, that showed that the football axis within the organisation was not in order. That has been addressed. The entire transfer process was also reviewed and improved."

Reflecting on that spell, Geelen adds: "During the Mislintat period I may have had a different responsibility as commercial director, but I still felt responsible. There is little point now in dwelling for too long on that specific period or on other individual directors or coaches who have left," Geelen said.