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March the 24th 2016 saw the passing of one of the greatest footballers ever – Johan Cruyff. To remember this great player, this week’s listening practice report is an adapted report from our archives. The post was originally published on May 1, 2011 as part of our World Cup Stars series. You can find explanations of key vocabulary (in bold) at the end of the post. You can listen to the podcast by clicking on the file below – you can also subscribe and listen to all our football-language podcasts – there are hundreds of them!
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This week (March the 24th 2016), Johan Cruyff passed away. He was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2015 but died peacefully with his family next to him. As recently as last week, he was tweeting his thoughts on Dutch football, and his passing will not diminish his lasting influence on the game. This influence is summed up in some of the following quotes:
Pep Guardiola, a player for Cruyff at Barcelona, said Cruyff “painted the chapel and Barcelona coaches since have merely restored or improved it”. England player and World Cup winner Bobby Charlton said, Cruyff was “one of those great, great footballers that made you excited whenever he got the ball”. And Argentine international and World Cup winner Osvaldo Ardiles tweeted, “Johan Cruyff: A revolutionary player. Best ever Dutch player. The talisman of one of the best teams ever: Holland 74. Total football.”
Here is our 2011 report on one of the great World Cup stars and all time great footballers.
Cruyff’s career can be divided into three broad periods: playing for Ajax, for Barcelona, and then his time as a coach.
Ajax
First at Ajax. Cruyff joined the Amsterdam team as a youth player of ten-years old. The Ajax team of the late sixties and early seventies introduced the style of play known as Total Football, where players positions were fluid and interchangeable, and the focus was on quick passing, movement and attack. Cruyff was perfect for this style of football, as he could turn on a sixpence, read the game beautifully and seemed to have the ball glued to his feet. With Ajax Cruyff, wearing the number 14 – it was rare at the time for any first team player to not wear a number from 1~11 at that time – won just about everything there was to win – but the three European Cups in succession in ’71, ’72, and ’73 stand out, as well as the treble of ’72 (League, domestic cup, and European Cup).
Barcelona
Such a player inevitably drew the interest of other big clubs around Europe and at the end of 1973, he moved to Barcelona where he spent five seasons. In his first year at the Spanish giants he was also part of the Dutch team which dazzled the world in the World Cup of 1974, losing to Germany in the final, but winning over most neutrals with their flair and invention, typified by their star player, Cruyff and his famous turn. At Barca, the Dutch maestro, helped the Catalan side win their first championship since 1960, won footballer of the year twice, adding to the title he won at Ajax in 1971, and was part of the side that destroyed Real Madrid 5-0 at the Bernabeu. The Barcelona fans loved him and he returned the compliment by giving his son a Catalan name, Jordi.
Coaching
After hanging up his boots in 1985, after stints in the US, Levante in Spain and back in Holland with Ajax and their rivals Feyenoord, Cruyff turned to coaching and became manager of his boyhood club, Ajax in 1985. As a manager, Cruyff continued where he’d left of as a player – winning. He won the UEFA Cup with Ajax, and then, as manager of Barcelona, he went on to win it again in 1989, and then the European Cup in 1992 as well as dominating La Liga with four titles in a row from 1991 until 1994.
He rose to prominence in the era of Total Football at Ajax and with the Dutch national team, and was perhaps the most complete attacking player of his day. His intelligence on the field was successfully transferred to the dugout – perhaps the one word that best sums him up is mesmerising.
Additional Languagecaster Links:
Vocabulary
accolade: honour, prize
kindred spirit: similar person, someone who thinks the same way
read the game: be aware of when to pass, know where your team-mates are, understand what will happen next
have the ball glued to (his) feet: be in complete control of the ball, be able to dribble with the ball
dazzle: amaze, entertain, surprise
flair: skill, ability, panache
hang up (his) boots: retire, quite, stop playing football
stints: Spells, times
mesmerising: Magical
Links
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- Wikipedia’s page on Johan Cruyff
- Image attribution: Bert Verhoeff Nationaal Archief / CC BY-SA 3.0 NL (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/nl/deed.en)
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