How Ajax Produces Football Stars
Young players training at Ajax. Photo via New York Times.
Footie fans would be familiar with Holland’s Ajax Amsterdam – no longer the European powerhouse it once was, but still very much the talent factory that churns out football stars, year after year.
The club trains about 200 young players at a time, from ages 7 to 19. But the scouts start tracking players as young as 5.
In time for the World Cup festivities, the New York Times goes hunting on “How A Soccer Star Is Made”, and reveals lessons that other nations (like ours, ahem) could probably learn from, but will probably find very hard to emulate.
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