2008–09 Eredivisie

This article is about the men's competition. For the women's competition, see 2008–09 Eredivisie (women).

The 2008–09 Eredivisie was the 53rd season of Eredivisie since its establishment in 1955. PSV were the reigning champions. The season began on 29 August 2008 with a game between Vitesse Arnhem and FC Groningen and ended on 10 May 2009. A total of 18 teams take part in the league, consisting of 16 who competed in the previous season and two promoted from the Eerste Divisie. The teams promoted from the Eerste Divisie at the end of the previous season were champions FC Volendam, and play-off winners ADO Den Haag. AZ clinched their second title, their first coming in 1981.

Eredivisie

Season	2008–09
Dates	29 August 2008 – 10 May 2009
Champions	AZ (2nd title)
Relegated	FC Volendam De Graafschap
Champions League	AZ (group stage) FC Twente (third qualifying round)
Europa League	SC Heerenveen (play-off round; via KNVB Cup) Ajax (play-off round) PSV (third qualifying round) NAC Breda (second qualifying round; via playoff)
Goals scored	870
Average goals/game	2.84
Top goalscorer	Mounir El Hamdaoui (23)
Biggest home win	Ajax 7-0 Willem II (12 April 2009)
Biggest away win	De Graafschap 0-6 Ajax (21 December 2008)
Highest scoring	PSV 6-2 Ajax (19 April 2009) Volendam 3-5 PSV (8 February 2009) Twente 6-2 Sparta (6 December 2008)
← 2007–08 2009–10 →

ADO

Ajax

AZ

Feyenoord
Sparta

Graafschap

Groningen

Heerenveen

Heracles

NAC

N.E.C.

PSV

Roda JC

Twente

Utrecht

Vitesse Arnhem

Volendam

Willem II

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Location of teams in the Eredivisie 2008–09

Overview

Club	Location	Manager	Previous managers during 2008–09 season	Kit maker	Shirt sponsor
ADO Den Haag	The Hague	Raymond Atteveld	André Wetzel	Hummel	Fit For Free
Ajax	Amsterdam	John van 't Schip	Marco van Basten	Adidas	Aegon
AZ	Alkmaar	Louis van Gaal		Canterbury of New Zealand	DSB Bank
Feyenoord	Rotterdam	Leon Vlemmings	Gertjan Verbeek	Kappa	Fortis
De Graafschap	Doetinchem	Darije Kalezić	Henk van Stee	kwd	Centric
FC Groningen	Groningen	Ron Jans		Klupp	Noord Lease
SC Heerenveen	Heerenveen	Trond Sollied		Jako	Univé
Heracles Almelo	Almelo	Gert Heerkes		Jako	Koninklijke Ten Cate
NAC Breda	Breda	Robert Maaskant		Klupp	Sunweb
N.E.C.	Nijmegen	Mario Been		Nike	Curaçao
PSV	Eindhoven	Dwight Lodeweges	Huub Stevens	Nike	Philips
Roda JC	Kerkrade	/ Harm van Veldhoven	Martin Koopman, Raymond Atteveld	Diadora	Aevitae
Sparta Rotterdam	Rotterdam	Foeke Booy		Patrick	Graydon
FC Twente	Enschede	Steve McClaren		Diadora	Arke
FC Utrecht	Utrecht	Ton du Chatinier	Willem van Hanegem	Puma	Phanos
Vitesse Arnhem	Arnhem	Theo Bos	Hans Westerhof	Legea	AFAB
FC Volendam	Volendam	Frans Adelaar		Jako	Café Bar
Willem II	Tilburg	Alfons Groenendijk	Andries Jonker	Masita	Destil

League table

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification or relegation
1	AZ (C)	34	25	5	4	66	22	+44	80	Qualification to Champions League group stage
2	Twente	34	20	9	5	62	31	+31	69	Qualification to Champions League third qualifying round
3	Ajax	34	21	5	8	74	41	+33	68	Qualification to Europa League play-off round
4	PSV	34	19	8	7	71	33	+38	65	Qualification to Europa League third qualifying round
5	Heerenveen	34	17	9	8	66	57	+9	60	Qualification to Europa League play-off round
6	Groningen	34	17	5	12	53	36	+17	56	Qualification to European competition play-offs
7	Feyenoord	34	12	9	13	54	46	+8	45
8	NAC Breda (O)	34	13	6	15	44	54	−10	45
9	Utrecht	34	11	11	12	41	44	−3	44
10	Vitesse Arnhem	34	11	10	13	41	48	−7	43
11	NEC	34	9	15	10	41	40	+1	42
12	Willem II	34	10	7	17	35	58	−23	37
13	Sparta Rotterdam	34	9	8	17	46	66	−20	35
14	ADO Den Haag	34	8	8	18	41	58	−17	32
15	Heracles	34	7	11	16	35	53	−18	32
16	Roda JC	34	7	9	18	38	58	−20	30	Qualification to relegation play-offs
17	De Graafschap (R)	34	7	9	18	24	58	−34	30
18	Volendam (R)	34	7	8	19	38	67	−29	29	Relegation to the Eerste Divisie

Source: ESPN Eredivisie Table
Rules for classification: 1) points; 2) goal difference; 3) number of goals scored.
(C) Champions; (O) Play-off winners; (R) Relegated
Notes:

Results

Home \ Away	ADO	AJX	AZ	FEY	GRA	GRO	HEE	HER	NAC	NEC	PSV	RJC	SPA	TWE	UTR	VIT	VOL	WIL
ADO Den Haag		1–1	3–0	2–3	1–0	0–1	0–1	2–2	1–1	3–0	0–2	1–1	1–2	1–2	0–0	3–1	2–0	0–1
Ajax	3–0		1–1	2–0	3–0	1–0	0–1	2–2	3–0	2–0	4–1	1–0	5–2	1–0	1–1	3–0	2–1	7–0
AZ	4–1	2–0		0–0	2–0	3–0	3–1	2–0	1–2	1–0	1–0	1–0	6–0	3–0	2–0	1–2	3–0	3–1
Feyenoord	3–1	2–2	0–1		1–3	0–0	2–2	5–1	3–1	0–2	1–0	2–3	1–0	1–0	5–2	2–2	5–0	1–1
De Graafschap	2–0	0–6	0–2	0–2		0–1	2–0	1–0	0–2	2–2	0–3	1–1	3–3	2–2	0–2	1–0	2–2	1–0
Groningen	3–0	1–0	0–2	3–1	3–0		2–3	2–0	1–0	2–0	0–1	2–0	3–0	1–4	2–0	2–3	5–0	0–0
Heerenveen	2–2	5–2	3–3	3–1	2–0	2–1		2–2	3–1	2–1	2–2	2–0	5–1	1–1	3–2	0–2	1–0	3–1
Heracles	3–1	1–3	0–2	3–1	0–0	1–1	1–1		4–0	1–1	0–2	2–0	2–1	1–2	1–1	0–0	1–1	1–0
NAC Breda	0–4	0–3	0–1	1–2	0–1	1–0	4–2	3–0		1–1	2–1	1–0	3–1	0–1	1–1	2–0	1–1	1–3
NEC	0–0	2–4	0–1	1–0	2–0	2–2	1–1	1–1	2–3		1–0	1–1	1–1	1–1	1–2	3–1	6–1	0–0
PSV Eindhoven	6–0	6–2	2–2	1–0	3–0	4–2	2–3	4–0	2–2	1–1		2–3	1–0	0–0	2–0	2–0	1–0	2–0
Roda JC	2–0	1–2	0–2	0–4	3–1	2–5	2–2	3–1	0–3	3–0	1–1		0–1	1–1	0–0	3–0	1–1	0–1
Sparta Rotterdam	2–5	4–0	0–2	2–1	0–0	1–1	4–1	1–0	4–0	0–2	0–2	2–2		1–2	1–0	0–0	4–0	0–1
Twente	1–0	0–2	3–0	1–1	3–0	2–1	6–0	2–0	4–1	1–1	1–1	4–2	6–2		0–0	2–1	2–1	2–0
Utrecht	3–1	0–2	0–1	2–2	3–0	0–1	2–1	2–0	0–0	0–2	1–5	3–1	3–3	3–0		4–0	0–0	1–0
Vitesse Arnhem	3–1	4–1	1–1	1–1	0–0	0–4	1–0	1–0	0–3	0–0	1–1	3–0	1–1	0–2	6–1		3–1	2–2
Volendam	0–1	1–2	0–2	2–1	3–1	0–1	2–3	3–1	2–4	1–1	3–5	3–1	3–0	1–2	0–0	1–0		2–2
Willem II	3–3	2–1	2–5	1–0	1–1	3–0	1–3	0–3	2–0	1–2	0–3	2–1	3–2	0–2	0–2	0–2	1–2

Source: Eredivisie.nl (in Dutch)
Legend: Blue = home team win; Yellow = draw; Red = away team win.

Top goalscorers

Pos.	Player	Club	Goals
1	Mounir El Hamdaoui	AZ	23
2	Luis Suárez	Ajax	22
3	Marcus Berg	Groningen	17
4	Roy Makaay	Feyenoord	16
	Danijel Pranjić	Heerenveen
	Blaise N'Kufo	Twente
7	Frank Demouge	Willem II	14
8	Ibrahim Afellay	PSV	13
9	Matthew Amoah	NAC Breda	12
	Marko Arnautović	Twente
Total:			870
Games:			306
Average:			2.84

Last updated: 11 May 2009
Source: ESPN Top Scorers

Play-offs

European competition (best of 3)

Contrary to the play-offs of previous years, only teams placed 6th through 9th compete in a play-off tournament for one spot in the second qualifying round of the UEFA Europa League 2009–10.

Semi-finals

Team 1	Pts	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg	3rd leg
Utrecht	3–7	Groningen	3–3	0–4	not played
NAC Breda	7–2	Feyenoord	3–2	4–0	not played

Final

Team 1	Pts	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg	3rd leg
NAC Breda	3–1	Groningen	1–1	2–0	not played

Relegation

The 16th and 17th placed teams, along with the teams from Eerste Divisie, participate in a play-off for two spots in 2009–10 Eredivisie.

Round 1

Team 1	Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Telstar	0–1	MVV	0–0	0–1
TOP Oss	0–3	Dordrecht	0–2	0–1

Round 2 (best of 3)

Team 1	Pts	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg	3rd leg
MVV	1–4	De Graafschap	2–3	2–2	not played
Excelsior	1–4	RKC Waalwijk	1–2	1–1	not played
FC Zwolle	3–6	Cambuur	2–1	1–3	0–2
Dordrecht	1–4	Roda JC	1–1	0–1	not played

Round 3 (best of 3)

Team 1	Pts	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg	3rd leg
RKC Waalwijk	6–3	De Graafschap	2–0	1–2	1–0
Cambuur	3–3 (p. 1–3)	Roda JC	0–0	1–1	2–2 (aet)

RKC Waalwijk and Roda JC will play in Eredivisie 2009–10.

Facts and statistics

• Ajax lost the opening match 2–1 away at Willem II. This was Ajax' first opening round defeat since the 1988–89 season.
• Ajax and Feyenoord both lost their opening matches. The last times this happened was in the 1965–66 season.
• ADO Den Haag topped the league table after two matches. The last time ADO was in first place was on 16 January 1971.
• NAC Breda led the Eredivisie after round six. This was the first time in club history that NAC were in first place of the Eredivisie.
• A record 6,067,288 spectators passed through the turnstiles, an average of 19,827 per match.

Television rights

The Dutch public broadcaster NOS broadcast the match highlights after beating rival broadcaster RTL for the contract. The new pay-per-view channel Eredivisie Live broadcast the live matches.

In Australia the Eredivisie was broadcast live and exclusive by Setanta Sports.

See also

• 2008–09 Eerste Divisie
• 2008–09 KNVB Cup