Almere City became the 55th team to qualify for the Dutch Eredivisie after they completed a double over Emmen FC on Sunday in the return leg of the final of the qualification fixture.
Almere City surprised all including themselves when they held a 2-0 advantage to the second leg and with the return of the Nigerian, Hamdi Akujobi, the club had more solidity in the defence to survive the onslaught of Emmen who were struggling to retain their Eredivisie spot no matter what it takes.
The home team started on a fast pace with the hope of reducing the deficit early and probably hitting the equalizer later on in the game but Almere City neutralized all their antics and efforts as both teams went into the halftime break goalless with the visitors still holding on to their two goals cushion.
The game that was goalless in the first half suddenly splurged to life inside five minutes of the second half when the visitors struck through Rajiv Van La Parra and before the ovation that greeted that goal died down, Almere City doubled the advantage in the 53rd minute through Jorrit Smeets. The visitors thus increased the aggregate scores to 4-0 and almost assailable lead with less than 40 minutes to play.
Emmen FC however reduced the tally in the 58th minute through Jari Vlak but they needed three more goals to force the game into extra time. They fought tooth and nail but they were unable to break the impregnable wall of Almere City defence marshalled by Hamdi Akujobi, Joey Jacobs, Van Bruggen and Theo Barbet.
The game ended 2-1 in favour of Almere City who cruised to the Dutch Eredivisie 4-1 on aggregate for the first time in their history.
The promotion ticket was achieved by the combined efforts of the players, the management staff and technical crew led by Alex Pastoor who became the seventh coach to promote a team to the Eredivisie at least three times. He is also the fifth coach to do so with three different clubs having guided Excelsior in 2009-10 and Sparta Rotterdam in 2015-16 to the topflight previously on both occasions as well.
Hamdi Akujobi an integral part of Alm ere City’s promotion effort was adjudged the best right back of the 2022-23 Eerste divisie season having featured in over 40 games in all competitions with five goals.
