While Frenkie de Jong trains with the Orange squad in Zeist, he advises the youth from a screen to mainly play outside, the most beautiful thing there is. For example on the square in Geuzenveld, Amsterdam, which half an hour later is officially called A. Nouriplein.
Named after his friend Appie Nouri, who had a heart attack almost five years ago during an Ajax practice match, resulting in serious brain damage due to oxygen deprivation. Nouri lives in low consciousness, here near the square.
Nouri connects even now that he is bedridden. Everything is here because of him. Everybody. Any color. Mothers with headscarves. fathers. Dozens of children. dignitaries. agents. Every denomination, all those shirts from different clubs, most of them from Ajax. There are hugs everywhere. A boxing here, old-fashioned shaking there. Selfies with mayor Femke Halsema.
Such a square, intended for football, basketball and fitness, is the ideal place for connection. Appie Nouri was a man, a boy actually, of fraternization, without him realizing it. He didn’t have to do anything extra for that. He was just like that. He meant something to others, without the neighborhood or the world needing to know. And he always kept smiling. A little shy, with happy eyes that said everything was going to be okay. He celebrated football and life. Always with number 34. Always a heart with the fingers, after a goal.
This Sunday they celebrate him. ‘Do you know who I am?’, Mayor Halsema asks the children at the podium. They are told that a stately lady with a special necklace is coming to the ward. But all those children came mainly for others, for football. The most beautiful words and the most applause are for Tiki Taka Touzani, the man with the artistic skill of street football, the inspiration for thousands of young people who dream about tricks, about pannas and akkas. The kids have seen all of his top player videos on YouTube or elsewhere.
‘We sometimes live more with the screen than in real life. Everyone is fighting for our time, our most precious possession,” says Touzani with his own flair. He asks the youth to play in the square. Not just now. Always. Together. With responsibility for each other. He gives advice: look after each other. Pay attention if someone is having a hard time. Then help him or her. As Nouri used to do, while he now needs help, 24 hours a day.
Willem van Hanegem, an unknown figure for the children and an indestructible icon for the elderly, completes the official opening of the square, which first bore the name of Nigel de Jong, with father Mohammed Nouri. Whether Appie gets the tribute? Brother Abderrahim says they will show him videos. They will tell him about this happy Sunday in June. Sometimes Appie responds with a gesture, with a smile. “He gets everything.”
Who knows, he may also have heard something about the aubade of the children around the field that has been bearing his name since Sunday. They sing: ‘Nouri, Nouri, Nouri.’