John Heitinga will have barely unpacked his boxes at the Ajax training ground and he’s already having to put out fires, which will not please the Dutchman. Having spent last season working as an assistant coach to Jürgen Klopp, Heitinga took on the manager’s role at the Johan Cruyff ArenA in the wake of seeing the Reds win the Premier League at the end of the 2024-2025 campaign.
He has a whole other task on his hand as he looks to win the Eredivisie as a manager in his own right, which won’t have been made easier by the club’s decision to dismiss some players via WhatsApp.
Seven Players no Longer Welcome at Club
It is easy to presume that John Heitinga had no knowledge of what has happened, but when you consider that Alex Kroes, the Technical Director at Ajax, has told seven players that they’re no longer welcome at the club, you have to assume that he’s done so with the new manager’s blessing.
There is a desire to overhaul the squad, which fell apart at the end of the 2024-2025 Eredivisie season and missed out on the title on the final day of the campaign. As a result, seven players received the WhatsApp saying that they wouldn’t be allowed on Ajax premises.
@primedollers Akpom🥲 || Hero of the dark times🦸🏾♂️🤩 #ajax #football #akpom #eredevisie #fyp ♬ original sound – primedollers
The seven players include Borna Sosa, the left-back who spent last season on loan with Serie A side Torino, as well as former Arsenal player Chuba Akpom. Carlos Forbs, who was once on Manchester City’s books, is also part of the group, as are Kristian Hlynsson, Christian Rasmussen, Jay Gorter and Branco van den Boomen.
Sosa, Akpom and Forbs were all brought to the club in the summer of 2023 under Sven Mislintat, the former Sporting Director who has since been sacked, and are contracted until 2028. Hlynsson and Gorter and Rasmussen and Van den Boomen are contracted until 2026 and 2027 respectively.
Drastic Measures Taken
The seven players have been informed that they will not be made to feel welcome if they arrive on Ajax property, whilst also being told that they won’t be included in any team activities. Their parking spaces have been revoked and the seven of them will only have one physiotherapist to work with between them.
The decision has been taken as a dramatic reaction to last season’s capitulation, when Ajax somehow managed to squander a seven-point lead at the top of the Eredivisie with just four games to go. Francesco Farioli resigned as the club’s head coach the following day.
Ordinarily, players would expect to be informed that they’re no longer part of the manager’s plans by the man himself, which is why these seven players being told courtesy of a WhatsApp message is such a big story.
In some ways, it is a tale of the modern age, with the advancements of technology meaning that the move can be made in what has presumably been seen as a relatively pain-free manner. Whilst that might be true for Kroes, it is almost certainly going to have made the whole thing more painful for the seven players, who would doubtless have preferred a more human touch.
Players’ Union Unimpressed
As you might imagine, the players’ union in Amsterdam has been left distinctly unimpressed by the WhatsApp move taken by Ajax. The Dutch players’ union, VVCS, released an official statement that was extremely critical of the football club. The statement said,
“The VVCS is surprised by the ban imposed on seven Ajax players under contract. These players are being explicitly isolated from their colleagues in the first team. The VVCS considers this to be a form of improper employment and unnecessary public damage to players who bear no responsibility for the situation that has arisen.”
Ajax dump Chuba Akpom, six others via WhatsApp
Chuba Akpom’s time at Ajax appears to be over, as the Dutch club reportedly told the Nigerian striker via WhatsApp that he is no longer needed. pic.twitter.com/wQbOi5As32
— Rifnote Sports (@Rifnotefootball) July 1, 2025
They also referred to the seven players as ‘victims’ of a misguided policy employed by Ajax that resulted in Mislintat being given ‘free rein’ at the time that the players were brought in. Although the Dutch giants will be hoping to get some money for the players, the decision to remove them from any kind of team training means that they will be seeking new clubs and those that they find will know that they’ll be able to get them for a cut-price fee.
Meanwhile, Ajax will have made other players wary of wanting to go there and the players’ union distinctly unimpressed; none of which Heitinga needs so early on in his managerial career.