Tadic revels in 'wonderful' achievement as Ajax make Champions League history
Ajax captain Dusan Tadic reflected on the team's 3-1 win over 10-man Borussia Dortmund on Wednesday.
Dusan Tadic basked in Ajax's "wonderful" achievement after the last-16 bound Dutch giants won their opening four Champions League group-stage games for the first time in their history.
Ajax made their numerical advantage count as they overturned a half-time deficit to outlast Group C rivals Borussia Dortmund 3-1 en route to the knockout phase on Wednesday.
Dortmund captain Marco Reus converted a 37th-minute penalty after star defender Mats Hummels was controversially sent off eight minutes earlier at Signal-Iduna Park.
Ajax went on to power past Dortmund thanks to goals from Tadic, Sebastien Haller and Davy Klaassen inside the final 21 minutes.
Eredivisie powerhouse Ajax also became the first Dutch team to win their first four matches in a single Champions League campaign, while they celebrated four successive wins in the competition for the first time since March 1996.
"It's wonderful; four matches and 12 points," captain Tadic – who has been directly involved in 20 goals in 28 Champions League matches for Ajax (nine goals and 11 assists) – at least eight more than any other player at the club – told RTL 7 after his 72nd-minute equaliser.
"It's a great feeling to beat such a good team in a great stadium like this.
"I thought we played very poorly in the first half. We lost possession too often. At half-time we said that we had to move the ball round faster and cut out the mistakes. The second half was much better."
Despite another win, Ajax head coach Erik ten Hag was not completely satisfied post-match on the road.
"We have to learn our lessons from how we played in the first half if we want to progress and learn. We made a lot of mistakes and let our opponents play to their strengths," he told RTL 7.
"We were too impatient, and surrendered possession far too often. But we also showed that we can play poorly for part of the game and still beat a strong opponent."
Haller, meanwhile, became only the fifth player to score in each of his first four Champions League appearances, after Ze Carlos (1993), Alessandro Del Piero (1995), Diego Costa (2014) and Erling Haaland (2019).
