KPMG investigation into Mislintat’s working method at Ajax completed: ‘Press release is ready’

NOS Football•today, 5:59 PM

The investigation at Ajax into a possible conflict of interest by the expelled technical director Sven Mislintat when purchasing players has been completed. Michael van Praag, chairman of the Supervisory Board at the Amsterdam club, announced this on Tuesday afternoon.

Ajax planned to issue a press release this week about the outcome of the investigation conducted by accounting and consultancy firm KPMG. “That is ready, but has now been overshadowed by what is happening here,” says Van Praag, referring to the suspension of the brand new general manager Alex Kroes, who is said to have traded in Ajax shares with insider information.

The 51-year-old Mislintat was appointed director of football affairs at Ajax in May last year. He signed a contract until the summer of 2026. The German spent more than 100 million euros on twelve new players, but was fired at the end of September. Ajax was at the bottom of the Premier League at that time. According to Ajax, there was too little support for Mislintat within the organization.

The dismissal followed revelations from the NOS about possible conflicts of interest. Ajax bought a player on the final day of the transfer period through a German agent’s office that owns shares in a private company of technical director Mislintat. Ajax was not aware of this.

Ajax then had an investigation into the German’s conduct. At the end of February, Ajax announced that the process was in its final phase, after which the most important findings and conclusions would be made public. That has now been postponed for the time being.

“We will have to call an extraordinary shareholders’ meeting,” says Van Praag. “We have to see whether it makes sense to deal with both issues, Kroes and Mislintat, at once, since you are already meeting anyway. You may have to meet for a whole day. That is also fun.”

Mislintat is about to return to his former club Borussia Dortmund, various German media report. It is still unclear whether Mislintat will become sporting director or technical director at Dortmund.

He previously worked at his hometown club as chief scout and technical director between 2006 and 2017. He then held similar positions at Arsenal and VfB Stuttgart, before joining Ajax last year.