We understand Joe Kinnear is interested in three players who are currently playing in the Dutch Eredivisie.
Urby Emanuelson – 22 year-old Dutch International left back
Here is some information on all three of them.
Urby Emanuelson is a 22 year-old left back and he looks an emerging star of the future
He was a member of the Dutch squad that won the UEFA U-21 Championship in 2006, who beat England in that terrific game that went to penalties in the semi-final. Urby was named in the UEFA Team of the Tournament as a left back. He stands nearly 5’10” tall.
In August of 2006 he made his debut for the Dutch national team in a friendly match against Ireland and has so far played 11 times for Holland and 91 times for Ajax with 6 goals.
He was born in June, 1986 in Amsterdam and is a Surinamese-Dutch footballer. He can play left back but can also play as a left midfielder. Emanuelson has come through Ajax’s youth system, joining them from Voorland SC. He appeared in Ajax’ first team squad for the 2004-05 season and made his debut on April 10, 2005. In the 2005-2006 season he became a first team regular and won the 2005 Johan Cruijff-schaal and the 2006 KNVB Cup.
We’ve been interested in this player for over a year now.
Dirk Marcellis is a 20 year old born in Horst, Holland, and he plays for PSV Eindhoven. His preferred position is center back, but if needed he can play anywhere along the back four.
The youngster fitted into the Ajax defense comfortably when he replaced the highly-rated Brazilian central defender Alex, who went back to Chelsea in the summer of 2007, after being loaned out to PSV for a few seasons.
Dirk stands just less than 6 feet tall and is a very skillful footballer, and certainly one for the future.
He received his first call-up under national team coach Van Marwijk for the World Cup qualifying matches against Norway and Iceland, and made his debut on October 11th of this year against Iceland.
He has played over 43 times for Ajax and has played twice so far for the national side, after representing the Holland youth sides at U21 and U17 levels.
Tim de Cler was born on 8th November 1978 in Leiden, Holland, and currently plays as left-back for Feyenoord of Rotterdam. He has also represented the Dutch national team on 16 occasions.
He was selected for the 2006 FIFA World Cup, and during his career he has won two Eredivisie championships and three KNVB Cups. He moved to Feyenoord from Ajax in 2007 and has so far played 32 times for the Rotterdam club, having previously played 157 times for Ajax.
At 30, he’s not young, but maybe he can be brought in for a reasonable fee, to give Jose Enrique some competition at left-back. He stands just over 5’10”.
If we could sign the first two, Urby Emanuelson and Dirk Marcellis, we’d have a good left-back and another young center-back, who can also play anywhere along the back four. That would really strengthen our defense and both players are still young, and in their early 20s.
Of course it could be that Joe will bring in Sol Campbell from Portsmouth, and that would have the added advantage of Sol being able to pass on his football knowledge to our up and coming young central defenders, Steven Taylor, Seb Bassong and Tamas Kadar.
The reports suggest Joe would want to sign Sol for a year and a half, which should be enough time for young 18 year-old Hungarian Tamas Kadar to be pushing for a first team place. Sol just turned 34 in September.
Not sure how much the two Dutchmen would cost in the transfer market.
Comments welcome.
46 comments so far
dan
Dec 3, 2008 at 4:55 AM
Comment #41Out of those 3 I would make a desperate attempt to sign de Cler in Jan because…
1. I dont think we have a mackem in Milan’s chance of signing Emanuelson and how much would he cost!
2. The other guy is I think playing in the first team and we have enough ‘jack of all trade’ defenders, we need a specialised LB.
3. de Cler has just turned 30 and played for the dutch national side 16 times, making him an experienced international. He would IMO be a good mentor and foil for Enrique and would leave the door open for him to play in the future, unlike Emmanuelson who is a similar age.
4. He may be up for one last big break in his career and the prem could provide it.
5. We could afford him.
6. With any luck he could be the Habib Beye of the left, if he is serious enough about playing for us.
Regarding Xisco, I am of the opinion that we should bring up up through the reserve team and give him plenty of time. He is still very young and we would not recoup anywhere near the £6million we payed for him anyway. As I have said on this blog before I think he could turn out to be very special indeed in a couple of years, he has several Shearer like qualitys. Ranger is also a one to look out for in the future and should not be rushed into the first team.
dan
Dec 3, 2008 at 5:09 AM
Comment #42Ed I think you should forget about Sol Campbell. He had his chance to come here a few years ago and he didnt want to.
I would have took him then ( and we could have used him then) but at 34 does he really have much playing time left in him.
We need to forget about these hasbeen players looking for huge pay packets an sign more Bassongs.
Any way with Collo and Bassong playing so well and Taylor in reserve, and Tozer and Kadar coming through. Do we really need another CB?
UTD111
Dec 3, 2008 at 9:10 AM
Comment #43Like the bit about “he stands nearly 5′ 10″ tall” Ed.
So that’ll be 5′ 9.5″ and a bit then!!!! LOL
Michael
Dec 3, 2008 at 10:35 AM
Comment #44get the two youngsters sod the old one.
Cartoon
Dec 3, 2008 at 2:44 PM
Comment #45Emmanuelson &Dirk marcellis thats sounds good………………………….
Cyprus-Toon
Dec 4, 2008 at 9:49 AM
Comment #46We should be looking at getting experienced EPL players in & not kids who won’t even feature in the 1st team for a few years!! Its the 1st team that needs strengthening not th reserves for christs sake…. I know we won’t get that much money if any but why bother looking abroad for players, I say we try to get some of the good players from teams like Hull, Stoke, WBA, Fulham etc for now to help get us up the table, then in the summer look at getting others quality players in 🙂