The numbers are brutal. The picture, even worse.
Ajax, once the automatic entry on every European fixture list, are now fighting just to stay in the continental conversation. Last weekend’s 1-2 home defeat to FC Twente did more than sting the pride in Amsterdam; it ripped a hole in their season’s safety net.
Twente walked out of the Johan Cruijff ArenA with three points and fourth place. Ajax were left with 48 points, two behind the Tukkers, and a fixture list that reads more like a warning than an opportunity.
A table that suddenly bites
That loss reshuffled the VriendenLoterij Eredivisie table at the worst possible moment for Ajax. Twente’s leap into fourth currently carries a Europa League ticket. Ajax have slipped into the chasing pack, and the margin for error has almost vanished.
On paper, two points is nothing. On the pitch, with this schedule, it feels a lot heavier.
Ajax now face two away trips, to Heracles Almelo and NAC Breda, before a brutal closing stretch: PSV at home, then FC Utrecht and sc Heerenveen. Utrecht and Heerenveen are not just awkward opponents; they are direct actors in the same European drama.
This is no gentle run-in. It’s a stress test.
Utrecht: the bogey team with momentum
Utrecht sit ninth, one point behind Sparta Rotterdam, who currently hold the final play-off spot with 41 points. They are chasing, hungry, and right in Ajax’s path.
And history is no comfort here.
Ron Jans’s Utrecht have become a genuine problem side for Ajax. The Amsterdam club have beaten them only once in the last five meetings. That is not an accident, it is a pattern.
Utrecht’s form backs it up. They have lost just two of their last ten league matches, and those defeats came narrowly against the two dominant forces in the country: 4-3 against PSV and 0-1 against Feyenoord. They are organised, resilient, and used to going toe-to-toe with bigger names.
For Ajax, this is exactly the kind of opponent you do not want to see when your season is wobbling.
Heerenveen lurking, four points back
Then there is Heerenveen. Quietly, steadily, they have moved into position.
The Frisian club are unbeaten in five league games and sit seventh, only four points behind Ajax. That gap is small enough to be dangerous, especially with the two sides meeting on the final day at the Abe Lenstra Stadium.
Earlier this season, Óscar García’s Ajax already stumbled against Heerenveen. A 1-1 draw at the Johan Cruijff ArenA underlined how stubborn the Frisians can be and how fragile Ajax can look when the rhythm of the game slips away from them.
Now picture that final day: a packed Abe Lenstra, Heerenveen with a shot at Europe, Ajax possibly clinging to a play-off place or worse. Heerenveen have the chance not just to qualify themselves, but to push Ajax into the play-offs or even down to seventh. One match, potentially, with enormous consequences.
The play-off trap – and a cup lifeline
If Ajax do tumble into the play-offs, their focus will inevitably stretch beyond the league table to the cup final on Sunday 19 April. NEC face AZ, who currently sit sixth.
The stakes are clear. The KNVB Cup winner goes straight into the Europa League. For AZ, a victory would wipe away the uncertainty of the play-offs and hand them direct European access.
For Ajax, strangely, that could be good news.
If AZ lift the cup, they avoid the play-offs, which could slightly ease the congestion and competitive pressure around those spots. Given Ajax’s recent struggles against the Alkmaar club – they last beat AZ in 2021 – relying on them feels uncomfortable, but the reality is blunt: an AZ cup win might indirectly improve Ajax’s odds of sneaking into Europe via the league structure.
This is where Ajax now find themselves. Calculating scenarios. Watching other clubs. Hoping.
From certainty to doubt
The idea of Ajax finishing seventh and missing out on Europe altogether once sounded absurd. Now it sits there on the horizon, no longer hypothetical, shaped by form, fixtures and a season that never truly settled.
Twente have overtaken them. Utrecht and Heerenveen are closing in. PSV are still to come. Every match from here on is loaded with consequence.
Ajax used to define the standard for Dutch clubs in Europe. Over the next few weeks, they will find out if they can still even meet the minimum.
