The question would have sounded absurd in August. It no longer does now. Can Ajax really tumble as low as seventh and miss out on Europe altogether?
The 1-2 home defeat to FC Twente last weekend did more than sting the pride in Amsterdam. It rearranged the VriendenLoterij Eredivisie landscape. Twente walked out of the Johan Cruijff ArenA with three points and fourth place, nudging Ajax down the ladder and tightening the noose around their European ambitions.
Twente now sit fourth, in the Europa League zone. Ajax trail by just two points, 48 to Twente’s tally, but the numbers hide a harsher truth: the run-in is brutal.
A run-in that can break a season
Ajax face two away games first, against Heracles Almelo and NAC Breda. On paper, those fixtures are supposed to be the “manageable” ones. In reality, every slip now carries a heavy price. There is no safety net, no margin for error.
Then comes the real test. PSV, champions and relentless front-runners. FC Utrecht, desperate and dangerous. sc Heerenveen, quietly circling just behind.
Those last three games will decide whether this season is remembered as a wobble or a collapse.
Utrecht sit ninth, one point behind Sparta Rotterdam, who currently hold the final play-off spot with 41 points. That alone guarantees a snarling, high-stakes meeting. But there is more history here. Ron Jans’s Utrecht have turned themselves into a genuine bogey side for Ajax. In the last five league clashes, Ajax have beaten them only once. One win in five for the club that once treated most domestic fixtures as a formality.
Utrecht’s form backs up the sense of threat. They have lost just two of their last ten league matches, and those defeats came by a single goal against the league’s two heavyweights: 4-3 against PSV, 0-1 against Feyenoord. They do not go quietly. They do not roll over.
Heerenveen lurking, Ajax wobbling
Heerenveen are another problem waiting at the end of the road. The Frisians have strung together five unbeaten league games and climbed to seventh, only four points behind Ajax. That gap is slim enough to make the final day feel like a trap.
Earlier this season, Óscar García’s Ajax could not break them down at home. That match finished 1-1 at the Johan Cruijff ArenA, another sign of how far Ajax’s domestic aura has faded. Now the return fixture at the Abe Lenstra Stadium looms as a possible reckoning.
If results go against Ajax in the coming weeks, Heerenveen could walk into that last round with a chance not just to frustrate them, but to push them into the play-offs themselves. One bad afternoon in Friesland, and Ajax’s fate might be sealed by a club that has spent the season quietly climbing rather than loudly proclaiming.
The play-off trap – and a lifeline from Alkmaar
Drop into the play-offs, and Ajax’s season takes on an entirely different tone. The club that measures itself in titles and European nights would be scrapping for a backdoor route into continental football.
In that scenario, all eyes in Amsterdam would also drift to De Kuip on Sunday 19 April, where the cup final pits NEC against AZ. The equation is simple: the KNVB Beker winner goes straight into the Europa League.
AZ, currently sixth, could dodge the play-offs altogether with a trophy. That twist could indirectly help Ajax. If AZ take the cup, one more direct European ticket is spoken for, and the play-off picture shifts. Given recent results in the North Holland derby, Ajax might not mind that at all. They have not beaten AZ since 2021, a stark statistic for a club used to dominating their provincial rival.
So the landscape is clear. Twente have shoved Ajax out of the comfort zone. Utrecht and Heerenveen are charging. AZ hold a potential lifeline in the cup.
Ajax still control parts of their destiny, but every misstep now opens the door to a scenario that once felt unthinkable: a club of their stature staring at seventh place, and a season without Europe.
