🏏 Fri, 11 Sep 2026 20:00 CEST
AZ Alkmaar
vs
Willem II
4-2-3-1 vs 4-2-3-1
Substitutes
Substitutes
Match Preview
- AZ Alkmaar come into this one with a perfect record: five wins from five, 15 points and top spot, with 16 goals scored and only five conceded for a goal difference of plus 11. PSV sit second on 13. Willem II are 17th, having taken a single point from four games while shipping 13 goals and scoring four. Few Eredivisie fixtures this season offer a starker contrast.
- AZ's run has included plenty of away work. They beat ADO Den Haag 2-0 at home on the opening weekend, then won 4-1 at Utrecht, kept another clean sheet in a 2-0 win at Fortuna Sittard, outscored Go Ahead Eagles 5-2 at home and edged Heerenveen 3-2 on the road in round five. Three away trips, three wins, and 16 goals in total.
- Willem II returned to the top flight after a single season away, coming through the play-offs, and have assembled a squad heavily reliant on loans and academy graduates. They lost 4-1 at Go Ahead Eagles, were beaten 4-1 at home by NEC, picked up their only point in a 2-2 home draw with Heerenveen, and then lost 3-0 at home to Excelsior in their most recent outing.
- Two Japanese players are among the AZ substitutes. Seiya Maekuma, 28, is a right-back who was named in the 2023 J1 League Best XI at Cerezo Osaka and has represented Japan, with his work keeping Son Heung-min quiet in the Europa League among his European highlights. Alongside him is 21-year-old centre-back Rion Ichihara, a 185cm ball-playing defender from the RB Omiya Ardija academy who made the 2025 J2 League Best XI.
- Willem II's centre-back pairing both know AZ intimately. Maxime Dekker, 22, is a 190cm left-footer who graduated from the AZ academy and is valued for the quality of his distribution from the back. Beside him, 23-year-old Finn Stam arrived on loan from Jong AZ and developed at both AZ and Groningen. There is another AZ product on the bench in 20-year-old midfielder Casper Bogaart.
- The reunion cuts both ways. AZ substitute Ies Hoornkamp, 28, played for Willem II earlier in his career, along with FC Den Bosch and Heerenveen, before breaking out at Heracles Almelo. He scored 10 goals in 14 Eredivisie appearances in the first half of 2025-26 and cost AZ around 4.5 million euros. A poacher's instinct inside the box makes him a serious threat if he is introduced against his old club.
- AZ's double pivot blends generations. Jordy Clasie, now 35, made 129 appearances for Feyenoord, played Premier League football with Southampton and has 11 caps for the Netherlands; at 169cm he still dictates tempo with his tackling and passing. Next to him is Peer Koopmeiners, 26, the younger brother of Juventus midfielder Teun, whose 186cm frame and set-piece delivery produced seven assists in 34 appearances in 2024-25.
- The attack is stocked with homegrown talent. Calvin Stengs, the 27-year-old Netherlands international, is back at his boyhood club after spells at Nice, Antwerp, Feyenoord and Pisa, and supplies the final ball from the number 10 role. Mex Meerdink, 23, whose father Martijn also played for AZ, scored twice in the 2022-23 UEFA Youth League final, while 21-year-old Rosangelo Dahl has already opened the scoring against Fenerbahce in the Europa League.
- Willem II's experience is concentrated in the full-back positions. Hidde ter Avest, 29, was a long-serving regular at Utrecht and Twente and also played in England with Oxford United, offering attacking thrust and crossing quality from the right. On the left is Nathan Tjoe-A-On, 24, who has played for Heerenveen, Excelsior and Swansea City. In midfield, academy products such as 20-year-old Uriel van Aalst carry the load.
- The visitors' bench holds two very different options. Chidozie Obi-Martin is an 18-year-old Denmark striker, 188cm tall and a prolific youth-level scorer who arrived via Manchester United. The alternative is Thomas Verheydt, 34 and 192cm, a target man with long service at ADO Den Haag and Go Ahead Eagles. How Willem II balance that youth and physical presence up front is one of the subplots worth following.