Name: Ronaldo Avendaño Barros Grade:10°B

Activity:

Page 37; Points 7,8,9

7. I chose Johan Cruyff

8.

 Johannes Cruijff, or better known internationally as Johan Cruyff.

 Born in Amsterdam; April 25, 1947 - died in Barcelona, March 24, 2016, was a Dutch
soccer player and coach.
 He is considered by the IFFHS as the best player in Europe and the second best player of
the 20th century, behind Pelé.
 He spent ten seasons in the Ajax Amsterdam first team. He then signed in 1973 for F.C.
Barcelona, from which he would leave in 1978 to join the North American Soccer League.
There he spent three seasons, interspersed with a season at Levante UD who played in the
Second Division of Spain. He finally returned to the Dutch league in 1981, playing two
seasons at Ajax and his last season as a player at Feyenoord in Rotterdam. He won five
Dutch Cups, eight Dutch Leagues, three European Cups, an Intercontinental Cup and a
European Super Cup with Ajax, a Dutch League and a Dutch Cup with Feyenoord, and a
Spanish League and Spanish Cup with F.C. Barcelona.
 He received the Ballon d'Or three times (1971, 1973 and 1974), a brand he shares with
Michel Platini and Marco Van Basten. Cruyff was the most famous exponent of the soccer
philosophy known as "total soccer", developed by Rinus Michels.
 In 1984, after retiring as a player from the field of play, Cruyff became coach of Ajax and
achieved two Dutch Cups and a European Cup Winners Cup, later he would become coach
and honorary president of the F.C. Barcelona, a club of which he was an influential advisor
and also collaborated with the Catalan federation in sports and social projects. He
achieved a Spanish Cup, four Spanish Leagues, three Spanish Super Cups, a European Cup
Winners' Cup, a European Cup and a European Super Cup with Barcelona.
 For me it was my idol and I managed to make many changes to soccer, a before and after,
according to my opinion when it comes to playing soccer, the invention of tactical plays
and, in addition to this, playing in my favorite team, FC Barcelona, with which I achieved
many merits. In addition to achieving others with Ajax for the world, he would have been
the main reference of that century if he had won the world final in '74.

9. The 20th century person I admire is Johan Cruyff because he was an impressive player he made
many changes to soccer.

Johan Cruyff's childhood, Jopie as his mother affectionately called him, was linked to a soccer ball
and to Ajax in Amsterdam, because at only ten years old he was chosen among 300 other children
to be part of the lower categories of the club. His mother worked as a cleaning staff at the club
and convinced the coach to select Johan to be part of his players.
On July 8, 1959, when he was twelve years old, his father died of a heart attack, for which he was
forced to help with the family finances. A year later he would leave his studies to devote himself
exclusively to soccer and the following year he would find a new father figure in the caretaker of
the Ajax field whom he helped in his work.Coach Rinus Michels prepared a physical exercise
program for Johan, specially designed to develop his frail complexion, so that he was able to
withstand the rigors of a professional career. Within the structure of Ajax, he quickly went through
all the lower categories (including jobs as a shoe shine and wardrobe keeper), until he managed to
reach the first squad, on the recommendation of Vic Buckingham, and made his debut in the
Dutch First League at the age of 17, scoring the only goal of his team on the day of their debut.
Johan Cruyff was the driving force behind Ajax's successes from the mid-1960s to the early
1970s.The debut game was held on November 15, 1964, facing the GVAV Groningen. This was the
beginning of the career of the considered best European player in history, which would contribute
to making Ajax the clear dominator of football on the old continent, achieving 6 Leagues and 4
Cups, 3 European Cups, 1 Intercontinental Cup and 1 Super Cup. of Europe.

He spent ten seasons in the Ajax Amsterdam first team. He then signed in 1973 for F.C. Barcelona,
from which he would leave in 1978 to join the North American Soccer League. There he spent
three seasons, interspersed with a season at Levante UD who played in the Second Division of
Spain. He finally returned to the Dutch league in 1981, playing two seasons at Ajax and his last
season as a player at Feyenoord in Rotterdam. He won five Dutch Cups, eight Dutch Leagues, three
European Cups, an Intercontinental Cup and a European Super Cup with Ajax, a Dutch League and
a Dutch Cup with Feyenoord, and a Spanish League and Spanish Cup with F.C. Barcelona.He
received the Ballon d'Or three times (1971, 1973 and 1974), a brand he shares with Michel Platini
and Marco Van Basten. Cruyff was the most famous exponent of the soccer philosophy known as
"total soccer", developed by Rinus Michels.In 1984, after retiring as a player from the field of play,
Cruyff became coach of Ajax and achieved two Dutch Cups and a European Cup Winners Cup, later
he would become coach and honorary president of the F.C. Barcelona, a club of which he was an
influential advisor and also collaborated with the Catalan federation in sports and social projects.
He achieved a Spanish Cup, four Spanish Leagues, three Spanish Super Cups, a European Cup
Winners' Cup, a European Cup and a European Super Cup with Barcelona.

As a coach The football Cruyff liked his teams to play was based on two main concepts:
offensive and control play and innovations on the field. Influenced by his former coach and
coach Rinus Michels, he was of the opinion that a team was built from midfield, with
players capable of moving the ball quickly, offering assists to the forwards and knowing
how to get from behind to attacking positions. . In the F.C. Barcelona took this idea to the
extreme, coming to play with three defenses (with its famous 3-4-3) and dispense with a
center forward to be able to populate the center of the field with players such as Josep
Guardiola, José Mari Bakero, Guillermo Amor or Michael Laudrup, which may seem like a
contradiction with the offensive game, but for Cruyff the forwards had to play on the wing
(Hristo Stoichkov on the right and Txiki Begiristain on the left) so that offensive midfielders
arrived at their centers and in this way decentralized rival centrals, leaving them without
knowing who to score. Another technique he liked to use to avoid markings by rival
defenses was exchanging end positions.