Feyenoord had closed the past season in third place after an impressive, and undefeated, cavalcade started since coach Advocaat’s arrival at the helm of the team in October 2020. For such reason, he was confirmed in charge and everything went almost perfectly at least until mid-December, when it was announced that former-AZ Arne Slot would have replaced him at the end of the campaign.
It was then, while they were sitting on the third spot, that Feyenoord suffered their first defeat in Dutch soil in over a year, while they were never that brilliant in their European campaigns.
Three more wins followed, with Feyenoord reaching their best position in the season, the second place, but something occurred within the team - or between the coach and his players - and a deep crisis began.
In fact, between weeks 17 and 27 Feyenoord would win only 3 games, thus falling off the top 4. Back-to-back wins between weeks 28 and 29 were sufficient for them to obtain a ticket for the play-offs for a place in the next Europa Conference League but, after that, they would only win again in the last round of the regular season.
However, they achieved European football thanks to wins over Sparta Rotterdam and FC Utrecht in the play-offs.
Feyenoord drew far too many games (11) and certainly conceded too many goals (36) despite an impressive Senesi at centre-back, but it is offensively that they had the major problems. In fact, coach Advocaat kept complaining about the absence of a reliable striker with Jorgensen (arrived-in-January) Pratto and, to a lesser extent, Linssen failing to score with the needed regularity. The team had thus to rely mostly on Berghuis, who netted 18 goals and produced 14 assists, and it is no surprise that they lost all the games he missed.
If they aim at competing for the title again, Feyenoord will have to strengthen themselves in all departments, while Slot’s arrival is certainly good news for the Rotterdam side, considering all he did at AZ Alkmaar.
