If a 10-year-old needs a nudge to suggest that a career in football is worth pursuing, they do not come much stronger than one from Dennis Bergkamp.
Donny van de Beek may have burst onto the European scene with his goals against Juventus and Tottenham over the last month, but over a decade ago he had a seal of approval from the former Ajax and Arsenal man.
Bergkamp was working as a youth coach at Ajax when Van de Beek joined his Under 12s for the 2008-09 season. He took a shine to the talent.
Donny van de Beek scored the only goal of the game as Ajax beat Spurs on Tuesday night
Dennis Bergkamp (left) alongside Van de Beek as a young player in Ajax’s academy
Bergkamp identified Van de Beek as a talent for the future when he coached him at Ajax
When Frank de Boer became Ajax boss, Bergkamp, promoted to his assistant, almost immediately told him about Van de Beek: ‘Dennis started talking enthusiastically about a talent in his youth team.
‘It was a boy who reminded Dennis of himself at that age. That was the signal for me to keep an eye on that guy. That was Donny.’
Youth coach Ruben Jongkind recalled the same story to Sportsmail: ‘Bergkamp, he was the one who saw when he was 10, “This is going to be a great player’. I said, “I didn’t see it, how did you know?”‘
Bergkamp may have spotted what others did not, but Van de Beek could have missed out on becoming one of the most exciting young midfielders in Europe if his mother had her way.
Van de Beek’s mother was not keen for him to play football when he was growing up in Nijkerk
Instead he spent time climbing wooden beams in his family home, a farm, at a young age
The 22-year-old comes from an area of Holland, Nijkerk, which is known for its farmers. And his family lived on a farm in Nijkerkerveen during his formative years.
He was more known for climbing wooden beams in the family home than he was football during his early years. Gerdina, his mother, shared that lack of enthusiasm for the sport.
His dad, Andre, on the other hand, took him along to Veensche Boys.
‘After the first training session, he was completely sold and the ball never disappeared from his life,’ Andre told AjaxShowtime in 2016.
But his dad took him to a training session at Veensche Boys and Van de Beek never looked back
He was so talented that by the time he was 10, Utrecht, Feyenoord and PSV were all chasing him. The family had Ajax season tickets, though, and they were always going to select the Amsterdam giants.
Even though Bergkamp was enthusiastic about Van de Beek from an early age, there were issues with his game. Bergkamp told Jongkind he needed additional individual work.
Jongkind continues: ‘We put him under a system of pretty rigorous physical training. He needed that. He came from farmers.
‘That area of Holland is pretty strong farmers there. But he needed to transfer that to the field.
He went through additional physical training and worked on his finishing at youth level
‘He was benefiting from the performance department a lot. We got in people from American Football and from Judo.’
Eventually, Van de Beek caught the eye of an even greater figure than Bergkamp — Johan Cruyff.
A meeting was held between Andre and Cruyff in Amsterdam. ‘I fell completely silent,’ Andre said. ‘Johan said: “I know your son, yes. That is Donny van de Beek. He is good at this and good at that…”
‘He was able to tell everything. Do you know how strange it is that your idol knows everything about your son? He was able to tell everything down to the smallest detail.’
Van de Beek was one of the stars in a very strong youth team and scored a goal that brought about memories of Bergkamp’s famous strike against Bayer Leverkusen.
‘He started to excel at U19 when he was U16,’ Jongkind recalls, ‘because they were playing fantastic football.
‘At Athletic Bilbao and Villarreal they used a match between Ajax U19s and Barcelona as an example for youth football. He benefited a lot. They worked on finishing too, which is not usually done in youth football.’
It was impossible to hold him back forever, and Van de Beek would make his debut against Celtic in the Europa League in November 2015.
Ajax won that game 2-1 and Van de Beek barely looked back. De Boer used him infrequently that season before Peter Bosz made him a regular member of his side in 2016-17.
Van de Beek (right) making his senior debut during a win against Celtic in November 2015
Van de Beek even featured in the Europa League final that season as a late substitute, with Barcelona and Bayern Munich starting to keep track of him.
Last summer, he turned down a move to Roma as he believed Ajax was the best place for his development. He has been proved right.
He has become the king of the ‘third man’ run, arriving late from midfield to latch onto forward passes in the style of Frank Lampard. Van de Beek has been one of the prime beneficiaries of Dusan Tadic’s switch to false nine, scoring 15 goals in all competitions this season.
He has become the king of the ‘third man’ run this season and links up well with Dusan Tadic
Van de Beek has also nailed la pausa, what the Argentinians call that moment of slowing the game down before making the right decision. Usually used to describe a No 10 waiting for the correct pass, Van de Beek used it to perfection for his goal at Spurs.
Now he is halfway to sending Ajax to a Champions League final. Few would have predicted that when he arrived at De Toekomst in 2008.
Well, few barring Bergkamp.