Sparta has started the Maurice Steijn era encouragingly. The Eredivisie’s difficult scorer replaced trainer Henk Fraser with the Hagenaar and seemed to lose on Saturday to Vangelis Pavlidis of AZ: Vito van Crooij saved a point for Sparta deep in injury time.
Steijn tried with a more attacking style of play than Fraser and after both teams had warmed up in the first half, opportunities arose on both sides. Fredrik Midtsjö and Lennart Thy had the first chances, but keepers Maduka Okoye and Peter Vindhal were able to distinguish themselves.
In the course of the first half, AZ got the upper hand, but Tijjani Reijnders, Zakaria Aboukhlal and Pavlidis did not get past Okoye. Pavlidis succeeded just after the start of the first half: the Greek was launched by Aboukhlal – edge offside – came face to face with Okoye and found the far corner.
AZ failed to advance through Reijnders and suddenly had to survive a stampede from Sparta ten minutes before the end. That worked miraculously: Pavlidis was in the right place with a shot by Tom Beugelsdijk and Sven Mijnans shot wildly from close range shortly afterwards. It seemed to be expensive opportunities for the least-scoring team in the Eredivisie, but Van Crooij had another whim in minute 94: due to a striking free kick from the Limburger, it was still a party at Spangen.
Closer Sparta is level with competitors Willem II and PEC Zwolle. The Castle Club will meet FC Groningen, PEC and Heracles Almelo. Number five AZ misses the opportunity to get one point from FC Twente: on Sunday the team of Pascal Jansen will meet Ajax at home, then FC Utrecht and RKC Waalwijk wait.
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