When it comes to the greatest footballer in the Netherlands, this brother deserves to be Cruyff, who is revered by the fans as the "King of the Netherlands".
Cruyff was already a keen sporter at a young age, having joined Ajax at the age of 10, but he loved not only football but also baseball, so he was involved in both. At the age of fifteen, he began to find it difficult to juggle two ball games, and eventually he gave up baseball and devoted all his mental time to football, which he considered his favorite and best sport.
Cruyff made his first appearance for Ajax at the age of 17 and scored his first league goal of his career on his debut. Since then, Cruyff has been playing more minutes and has been a regular in the league season since then, proving his quality with many goals, culminating in 23 appearances that season, scoring an astonishing 25 goals and helping Ajax to the league title.
Cruyff spent a total of 10 seasons at Ajax, during which he won the Champions League three times, two European Footballer of the Year, four Dutch Cup titles, one UEFA Super Cup and Intercontinental Cup title.
Then, at the end of the 1972-1973 season, Barcelona announced that they would bring the Dutch star into the team at a record transfer fee at the time. Although Cruyff had 10 years of experience in the Eredivisie, he was only a golden 26 years old at the time. He lived up to expectations, winning the league title in his first season in Spain, becoming an icon of football at the time, and he brought "all-round attacking football" to his Dutch national team.
He participated in the 1974 World Cup, which led the whole team to use this tactical system, and defeated many strong teams successively to reach the final, during which he named the "Cruyff Turn" In this World Cup, fans from all over the world have an even more memorable impression of him, but unfortunately lost 1-2 to the host West Germany in the final, and failed to win the first World Cup for the Netherlands, and this regret has not been fulfilled by Dutch players to this day, and he announced his retirement from the national team in 1977 to concentrate on club competitions. Although the Netherlands failed to win the title, Cruyff was the Ballon d'Or winner at that World Cup and was re-elected European Footballer of the Year the same year.
Perhaps Cruyff's early rise to fame led to a downward spiral in Barcelona's form and the inability to win another league title for the team, only helping Barcelona to the Copa del Rey in the 1977-1978 season. This season is also his last season with Barcelona as a player.
Cruyff then left Barcelona for the American Professional League, playing for two MLS teams (Los Angeles, Washington), but not winning any titles for his team. Leicester City in the English league then wanted to sign the slightly faded Dutch champion, but Cruyff did not accept the offer and returned to Spain, but this time not for Barcelona, but for another Spanish team, Levante. However, due to his frustration with the team's administrative handling and his injury, Cruyff only stayed for a season, and only played 10 games for Levante, handing in two goals.
He then returned to his club, Ajax, winning two more Eredivisie titles and one Dutch Cup for the team and his career, but Ajax was furious that Cruyff was not offered a new contract after two seasons and switched to Ajax's rivals Feyenoord.
He won his first league title for Feyenoord immediately after he arrived, and although he was 36 years old at the time, he was still a natural starter for the team, missing just one league game in the season. Of course, he also has a good partner this season, which is another well-known Dutch legend Ruud Gullit. It was also the last season of Cruyff's playing career, and he was named the best player in the Eredivisie this season, which was the perfect end to his playing career.
Despite retiring, the Dutch king did not put football down and embarked on his career as a team manager. He is back at Ajax, but this time as manager. In his three years in charge, he did not win the league title, but he won two Dutch Cups and one Champions League for the team, which is not a disrespectful result for a man with no coaching experience. He was then embraced by Barcelona and moved to coach the Spanish giants, whose current tactical system was established during the Cruyff era.
During this period, the Dutch king also had a very unique buying eye, and successively bought many well-known stars, such as Pep Guardiola, Ronald Koeman, Laudrup, Romario, Georgy Hadji, Hristo Stoichkov and so on. Cruyff's Barcelona established one of the most golden years of the team, winning the league title four years in a row, winning the two major European cups, and basically winning all the local and European awards, it was definitely not easy to get these honors, and Barcelona at that time was known as the "Dream Team" (Dream Team).
Many contemporary Barcelona stars such as Messi, Xavi, Iniesta, etc. are also produced under the youth training system established by Cruyff. But the football king has a habit of smoking about 20 cigarettes a day, which caused him to have a heart attack during his coaching years, but fortunately it did not immediately take his life, but he finally realized the consequences of smoking, he decided to quit smoking, and became an anti-smoking ambassador, in order to serve as a reference for future generations, hoping to quit smoking as soon as possible.
At the end of the 1995-96 season, Cruyff was forced to step down at odds with the then president of the team, Luis Nunez, and threatened that he would never return to Barcelona as long as Luis Nunez was in power. Cruyff did not manage any other team until 2009, when he chose to manage Catalan United, a four-year spell.
The Dutch star passed away from lung cancer on 24 March 2016 at the age of 68.
Player Profile
名称:克鲁伊夫(Johan Cruyff)
Date of birth: 1947-04-25
Nationality: Dutch
Height: 180cm
Weight: 78kg
Position: Front 锋
Player achievements
1965-1966 Eredivisie Champions (Ajax)
1966-1967 Eredivisie Champions (Ajax)
1966-1967 Dutch Cup (Ajax)
1967-1968 Eredivisie Champions (Ajax)
1969-1970 Eredivisie Champions (Ajax)
1969-1970 Dutch Cup (Ajax)
1970-1971 Dutch Cup (Ajax)
1970-1971 Champions League (Ajax)
European Footballer of the Year 1970-1971 (Ajax)
1971-1972 Eredivisie Champion (Ajax)
1971-1972 Dutch Cup (Ajax)
1971-1972 Champions League (Ajax)
1971-1972 UEFA Super Cup (Ajax)
1971-1972 Intercontinental Cup (Ajax)
1972-1973 Eredivisie Champion (Ajax)
1972-1973 Champions League (Ajax)
European Footballer of the Year 1972-1973 (Ajax)
1973-1974 La Liga Champion (Barcelona)
European Footballer of the Year 1973-1974 (Barcelona)
1973-1974 World Cup Ballon d'Or (Netherlands national team)
1977-1978 Spanish Copa del Rey (Barcelona)
1981-1982 Eredivisie Champion (Ajax)
1982-1983 Eredivisie Champion (Ajax)
1982-1983 Dutch Cup (Ajax)
1983-1984 Eredivisie Champion (Feyenoord)
1983-1984 Dutch Cup winner (Feyenoord)
Peak player ability
进攻（Offence）：20
防守(Defense):13
技巧(Technical):20
Power: 18
Speed: 19
体力(Stamina):17
Total capacity: 107
Cruyff's influence on football is very large, and the tactics of all-round football have been around since the Cruyff era. His famous stunt "Cruyff Turn" is still a favorite trick used by many stars to this day, all because of its high practicality. From the player to the manager's career, his achievements are also detached, and I have to admit that he is born with football.
Many of the stars of the modern era have been bred by him, and they often talk about how this generation of champions has made them more vivid, the only regret is that they did not win a single World Cup. In fact, the all-round player Jun Misugi in the Japanese manga "Soccer Player" is also based on Cruyff, and Jun Misugi in the comic is also a genius with heart disease.
FIFA Stats: