Football philosopher

Johan Cruyff looms large as Barcelona prepare to face Ajax for the first time, writes Adam Bate.

"It's a fantastic thing for football that these clubs get drawn against other," Ajax representative Johan Cruyff told reporters after the Dutch side were named alongside Barcelona, AC Milan and Celtic in Group H of this season's UEFA Champions League. Indeed, it is the only group comprising four European Cup winning clubs. "It's another group of champions," added Cruyff. "Football is like that and you've got to enjoy yourself and make the best out of it. We have to aim for the last 16. We have a young team and they play well together, so let's see what happens. Last year we showed that we were capable of knocking Manchester City out of Europe. Let's aim for the same again." His immediate reaction in Switzerland was deliberately inclusive of all three of Ajax's opponents and chose to focus on the challenge ahead. But it was disingenuous. For while every other combination of these fixtures has been played in the Champions League era, incredibly, this will be the first ever competitive meeting between Barcelona and Ajax. An extraordinary quirk given that the two clubs are so intertwined. In fact, it is a relationship that has come to define Barcelona's identity. Many great names from Ajax's past have ended up at Barca. Johan Neeskens, Patrick Kluivert, Marc Overmars, Edgar Davids and the De Boer brothers all won Europe's premier club competition in Amsterdam before heading for Catalonia. Vic Buckingham, Rinus Michels and Louis van Gaal each coached Ajax before making the same move. But these facts only hint at the connection. They do not explain it. For that, you need Cruyff. After winning three consecutive European Cups with Ajax and being named European footballer of the year on each occasion, he promptly helped Barcelona win La Liga for the first time in eight seasons in his debut campaign in 1973-74. More than that, he helped change the way people viewed football. As Cruyff said himself: "There is no medal better than being acclaimed for your style." Beginning in the late 1960s and perfected in that trio of European Cup wins in the early 1970s, Ajax devised what became known as totaalvoetbal or Total Football. Michels was the coach initially, although the fact that two of the three triumphs came under his less heralded successor Stefan Kovacs reveals the truth - this was essentially Cruyff's masterpiece. Constant interchanging of positions and fluidity within an overall structure thanks to the intelligence and spatial awareness of the players. "We discussed space all the time," said Barry Hulshoff, an Ajax player from 1966 to 1977. "Cruyff always talked about where people should run, where they should stand, where they should not be moving. It was all about making space and coming into space. It is a kind of architecture on the field. We always talked about speed of ball, space and time. Where is the most space? Where is the player who has the most time? That is where we have to play the ball. Every player had to understand the whole geometry of the whole pitch and the system as a whole."

Ideas

These were the ideas that Michels and Cruyff took with them to Barcelona. Of course, Barca were a football superpower prior to their arrival. The club had won three European honours and were the eight time champions of Spain. Surely any attempt to dismiss those achievements would be absurd. And yet, consider how figures such as Juan Manuel Asensi,