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During the weekend, there were nine matches of the 31st round of the Eredivisie championship in the Netherlands, where several unexpected results were recorded.
The country's champions, PSV Eindhoven, failed to win for the third consecutive match - this time Ronald Koeman's pupils lost 2-1 away to NEC Nijmegen, but this unexpected gift was not taken advantage of by Ajax from Amsterdam, who played a draw with RKC Waalwijk. With a victory, Ajax would have tied with PSV in points, but due to a better goal difference, they would have pushed them out of the leader position.
In the match in Nijmegen, the hosts took the lead first - in the 22nd minute, due to a mistake by the PSV defenders in the middle of the field, Brett Holman received a perfect pass from the right and "shot" past the PSV goalkeeper without any interference, and just two minutes later the same B. Holman forced Gomes to pull the ball out of the goal net again. The guests softened the ratio 30 minutes left when Philip Cocu scored.
Also, Ajax played a 2-2 draw with RKC away. In this match, at the very beginning, Ajax took the lead after Gabri's goal, but shortly after that Jan Vertonghen equalized the result. Wesley Sneijder tilted the result in favor of Ajax after just 10 minutes. Less than 20 minutes before the end of the match, Ruud Berger scored an unexpected point for the hosts. By the way, RKC finished the match with ten players, as Tarik Sektioui was sent off for a second yellow card late in the game.
After this match, Ajax not only failed to take advantage of the opportunity to surpass PSV in points but also dropped to third place, as AZ Alkmaar defeated NAC Breda away.
There are three rounds left until the end of the regular championship.
Results of the 31st round:
"NEC" 2 - 1 "PSV" 22' [1 - 0] B. Holman 24' [2 - 0] B. Holman 61' [2 - 1] P. Cocu
"RKC" 2 - 2 "Ajax" 8' [0 - 1] Gabri 10' [1 - 1] J. Vertonghen 20' [1 - 2] W. Sneijder 71' [2 - 2] R. Berger 89' T. Sektioui ("RKC") sent off
"NAC" 1 - 4 "AZ" 27' [0 - 1] D. Koevermans 45' [1 - 1] R. Penders 54' [1 - 2] R. Penders (own goal) 68' [1 - 3] M. Martens (from penalty) 79' [1 - 4] D. Koevermans
"Vitesse" 3 - 0 "Sparta" 3' [1 - 0] D. Lazovic (from penalty) 20' [2 - 0] P. Verhaegh 83' [3 - 0] D. Lazovic
"Roda" 2 - 0 "Excelsior" 48' [1 - 0] P.M. Kah 90' [2 - 0] A. Oper
"Heerenveen" 1 - 1 "Den Haag" 24' [1 - 0] A. Alves 42' [1 - 1] S. Kolk
"Twente" 1 - 1 "Heracles" 8' [0 - 1] I. Gluscevic 22' [1 - 1] K.E. Ahmadi
"Utrecht" 3 - 0 "Willem II" 14' [1 - 0] T. Caluwe 29' [2 - 0] H. Somers 66' [3 - 0] T. Cornelisse
"Feyenoord" 0 - 4 "Groningen" 50' [0 - 1] G. Lovre 59' [0 - 2] K.v.d. Laak 64' [0 - 3] G. Lovre 70' [0 - 4] K.v.d. Laak
Standings:
