AZ Alkmaar were well and truly dominating in the Netherlands, but Lazaró’s aim to become European Champions with a fully homegrown squad was proving much more problematic. They received another mass of derisory bids in the summer of 2032, including Man City only offering £70m for Raily Wau when they rejected £160m bids the previous summer. And in mid-June, 20 of their 22 first-team players were wanted, but the manager saw absolutely no point in selling.
Most of the money Lazaró had single-handedly accumulated for AZ was thrown away in one fell swoop by his board, who invested £153 million in a new 48,101-capacity stadium that’ll take three years to build. And they didn’t have the decency to name the stadium after their newly-instilled legendary manager. The board also finally agreed to improve the youth facilities, which had been at 17 for years.
Hunting Five In A Row
AZ are now evens favourites to win a fifth consecutive Eredivisie, followed by Feyenoord (3/1), Ajax (5/1) and PSV (11/1). Lazaró’s 10th season at AZ began with a tricky trip to Ajax, where his side lay down a marker as exciting striker Gery ten Teije’s 90th-minute strike edged a 3-2 victory. The striker bagged another brace as they thrashed Willem II 5-1, which set up a red-hot start to the season, including Manuel Piqué and Wau scoring doubles in a 7-0 hammering of Sparta Rotterdam and Myron van Brederode’s hat trick leading a 5-0 win over Dordrecht. They even beat PSV for the first time in four years to move 10 points clear in November.
AZ hit whole new levels as they destroyed Eredivisie, setting a new league record of 53 games unbeaten with a 1-1 at Feyenoord in late February. They eventually lost at PSV but even rotated sides led AZ’s homegrown stars to a fifth consecutive title. AZ won the title by four points from Ajax, finishing on a club record 91 points after 29 wins, 4 draws and 1 defeat, scoring 98 and conceding 20. ten Teije was Eredivisie top scorer with 21, van Brederode was the leading assisted with 17 followed by Piqué’s 16, and Piqué set a new league record average rating with a ridiculous 7.84.
Champions League
Another Champions League campaign began by battering Panathinaikos 4-1 away led by three Jayden Addai assists Wau’s late brace. ten Teije bagged a double in a 3-1 win over Porto but they got thumped 4-0 at Barcelona, nicked 1-1s at Leipzig and Man UFC and beat Club Brugge 3-0 and Freiburg 2-0. But a 4-0 loss at home to Real Madrid dropped them to 13th just one point outside the top eight.
They got a horrible draw in the playoff against Italian champions Juventus, but Piqué and Patrick Pol earned a 2-2 in Italy before van Brederode’s first-half strike edged a 1-0 win at home. Another Italian opponent followed as AZ took on Milan in the last 16 and AZ put in arguably the best performance of Lazaró’s reign to blow them away in the first leg led by a superb ten Teije performance. And an entertaining 3-2 defeat in Italy sent them into the quarter finals for just the second time.
AZ’s reward was to take on Real Madrid. They started the home leg under pressure but, when Pino was taken off by the physio, they pounced as Enoch Mastoras squared for Pol to steer home from 20 yards. van Brederode missed a huge chance just after the break and was made to pay as Endrick coolly finished a one-on-one. Both sides missed chances and it looked to be heading for a draw but, deep into injury time, Diampo crashed a shot off the post, the ball bounced out to Pol and he put Addai through to secure a massive 2-1 win. Madrid unsurprisingly dominated the second leg but missed loads of chances and forced several great saves out of Rome-Jayden Owusu-Oduro. They eventually scored through Bellingham only for Piqué to win a penalty that van Brederode converted. AZ held them off but the pressure eventually told as Endrick was somehow unmarked from a corner and they won 3-1. So the Champions League remained elusive with another narrow quarter final defeat to Europe’s big boys.
Targeting The Domestic Double
A few days after the Madrid disappointment, AZ faced PSV in their third TOTO KNVB Beker Final in four years. AZ got a flyer as Addai ran down the right and squared for ten Teije to score after 35 seconds but PSV had the better of the half and deservedly equalised. A drab second period followed with the only moment of note being Wau, who’d been in horrible form, missing a sitter. That was until a 94th-minute corner that landed at the feet of a PSV defender, who inexplicably passed to ten Teije and the striker passed to Zep Kalk to fire in his first senior goal to secure AZ’s second league and cup double!
AZ Academy Players Update
There was recognition for AZ’s academy products as Wau came 2nd in the World Player of the Year and Owusu-Oduro won World Goalkeeper of the Year. And ten Teije followed in the footsteps of Pol and Wau by winning European Golden Boy then won then European Golden Shoe.
For the first time since the very first season of this save, van Brederode wasn’t AZ’s top scorer. His 16 goals was usurped by the impressive ten Teije’s 31 followed by Wau (21, even though he scored once after February), Addai (18), Piqué (18) and Mastoras (8). van Brederode did lead the assists though with 22 followed by Piqué (19), Addai (16), Mastoras (13) and ten Teije (9).
AZ’s homegrown talents played 475 league games, down from last season’s high of 508, and scored 94 goals with 83 assists, plus 268 cup games with 35 goals and 32 assists.
Jong AZ did well again to finish 6th in Keuken Kampioen Divisie, while the under 18s finished 2nd in their league led by the attacking trio of Jeroen Ekkelenkamp, Max Mohr and Nicola Moscatelli.
We may be nearing the end of this challenge as some of our better players edge towards their 30s and the dreaded negative transfer balance curse struck in the summer. But we’ll give it at least one more season to see how AZ’s homegrown charges far in 2033/34.
Could AZ finally end their Champions League quarter final hoodoo? Join us next Monday to find out!
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