Neeskens, tough midfielder in Cruyff’s Ajax and Dutch teams

PARIS: Johan Neeskens, who has died aged 73, was the powerful but smooth engine of the Ajax and Netherlands teams that created “total football” with Johan Cruyff at their heart.

Neeskens was part of the Ajax team that won three straight European Cups and a key component of the “Clockwork Oranje” Dutch team that reached consecutive World Cup finals in 1974 and 1978, losing both.

“He was worth two men in midfield,” Ajax team-mate Sjaak Swart once told FIFA.com. Neeskens was a relentless runner and tough tackler, but he was also skilful. He finished the 1974 World Cup with five goals, second to only to Grzegorz Lato of Poland and top scorer in a Dutch team that also contained Cruyff and the flamboyant Johnny Rep.

“I always liked to play with style -- and to win,” Neeskens said. Johannes Jacobus Neeskens was born in Heemstede, west of Amsterdam, on September 15, 1951. He was signed from his home-town club by Ajax coach Rinus Michels in 1970.

Neeskens was right-back when the club beat Greek side Panathinaikos 2-0 for their first European Cup win in 1971. He then switched to central midfield, playing there as Ajax won two more titles in 1972, against Inter Milan, and 1973, against Juventus.

The Ajax team led by Cruyff and Neeskens formed the spine of the Dutch side that dazzled on the way to the 1974 World Cup final in West Germany. After just two minutes in Munich, Neeskens set two World Cup final records, scoring the quickest goal in as he converted the first penalty, awarded before any West German and most Dutch players had touched the ball.

“As a player it is a little bit strange because sometimes you need the feeling,” he later told FIFA. “I’d hardly touched the ball and wasn’t even warm. Then you have to make that penalty in front of 80,000 who are against you and of course the whole world is watching it.