Boy, the Dutch sure do hate Ajax Amsterdam.

Heading into the last match of the 2016 Dutch Eredivisie season, the Amsterdam giants were equal on points with fierce rivals PSV Eindhoven but ahead on goal difference, and needed a win to secure the title.

But while PSV had no trouble duly dispatching seventh-placed PEC Zwolle 3-1, Ajax stumbled against second-from-bottom De Graafschap. After looking on course for the title with an early opening goal, they conceded ten minutes into the second half to give PSV a second consecutive Dutch league title.

Incredibly, the scenes after Graafschap equalised were incredible. A Dutch football news broadcast footage of fans celebrating de Graafschap's goal from even other stadiums where other football matches were played. Everyone (except for the Ajax fans) seemed to be delighted that they had not won the title.

It is a larger reflection of how Ajax is viewed with suspicion and, in some cases, even derision in large parts of the Netherlands, despite being the country's most successful football club. A large part of it may lie in the fact that fans of other clubs have often perceived them as being arrogant and still basking in the glory of the 1970s, when under the legendary Johan Cruyff, they were easily one of the best teams in the world. But that aura, fans of other clubs feel, has never been shed.