Brian Brobbey is out of balance too often, I read at the NOS. Kind of crazy that he’s out of balance, I thought, with everything that’s happening at his club. But Roy Makaay didn’t mean it that way. He falls too often after a shot, and then it is difficult to get the ball in the right direction, the analyst added – perhaps he is too wild and rushed.
Or maybe he hesitates too much, I thought. Because he knows he has to score. For his colleagues, for the club, for the whole country. The need is increasing. Because of that entire series of matches without a win, because of what all those people say, because of what journalists write, because of the position in the rankings – a disgrace on Ajax’s reputation.
Some football players appeal to you more than others, and that sometimes starts with a name. Brian Brobbey sounds like Tintin. Or as Suske and Wiske. But with his own series: Brian Brobbey and the Bikkelharde Ballenjassers. Brian Brobbey Throws in the Beech. That’s how he grew up at Ajax. As the example boys’ book: born in the Bijlmer, always played football on the square with his brothers. Scouted at AFC at the age of eight. His childhood friends became his best friends and colleagues in Ajax 1.
The need to score has taken on immense proportions. Because he was allowed to come back after an unfortunate adventure in Leipzig. Marc Overmars had said to him: you are going to miss Ajax, you had your best years here, your youth. But you don’t know what you’re missing until you’re gone. When he was on holiday, he was with his mother in Amsterdam. Are you going to do anything else, Andy van der Meijde asked him during a car ride. He said: I’m already doing something, man, I’m with my mother.
Such a boy. Behind his stoic attitude, soft and pure. He was only nineteen when he left for Germany. Now he’s 21 and has to make it happen. It has to, for so many reasons bigger than Brobbey himself. Psychologizing is not allowed, they know all too well at Almere City, but I still saw nothing but doubt and fear in Brobbey’s darting eyes for the journalists’ questions, after he had missed three huge chances against PSV.
He is out of balance too often. Those few tenths of a second of doubt are disastrous. Steven Berghuis dared to mention it when Ajax finally won against FC Volendam this week: I think more than usual, I am indecisive, and then the moment is gone. Then you miss. And then you are filleted by analysts. Marco van Basten said: Brobbey has been in Ajax’s training for twelve years, but still has no idea what to do for the goalkeeper.
Who am I to contradict Van Basten – but I still wonder whether that is really the case. Now that Brobbey is getting a little love from John van ‘t Schip, who wants to bring back the family feeling, the experience, and gives his heart and soul to this after the death of his wife last month, things could just change. You already saw it dawn on Thursday, against Volendam. Give me that new book: Brian Brobbey and the Better Balance.
Marijn de Vries is a former professional cyclist and journalist.