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This is why Marc ter Stegen is not playing for Ajax: ‘The information from the medical staff…’

Míchel Sánchez made six somewhat surprising changes to Ajax's line-up on Tuesday for the league match with Willem II. Speaking to the cameras of ESPN, he explained his reasoning and revealed why Marc ter Stegen would not be involved.

"Well, the information from the medical staff is that Marc is recovering from a serious injury," the Spanish coach begins. "He has been injured for a long time and there is now an international break coming up. We think this is a good moment for Maarten Paes to play the match and for Marc to recover well for Saturday and then for the international break."

Tolu Arokodare is also absent, but for a different reason. "Some changes are forced. Tolu has been ill all week. He has a fever," Míchel explains. "We don't know whether he can play a few minutes today. We will see. He is on the bench today because he really wanted to be involved."

So Míchel has gone with Kasper Dolberg in attack instead of Tolu. Big-money signing Marcos Leonardo remains on the bench again. Ajax's other starters are Paes, Owen Wijndal, Lucas Rosa, Thilo Kehrer and Jorthy Mokio.

Willem II coach John Stegeman admitted he was surprised by the changes Ajax had made. "No, I certainly didn't predict that line-up correctly. I was very surprised. I had expected a maximum of two changes," he told the cameras of ESPN.

Stegeman added: "But he is changing it a bit more. Of course, he has a lot of very good players at his disposal. And I also understand that you have to keep players happy. They are all good players who are coming in as well, so it's not as if we should suddenly start thinking it will be easy because of that. But it is different, I didn't expect it."

See here the full line-ups for Ajax v Willem II.

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