When Ajax step on to field to face Tottenham on Tuesday night, more than half their team could be graduates from the club’s fabled academy.

To have even reached the quarter-final of the Champions League was a stunning achievement, given their meagre spending that puts them on a par with Championship sides like Aston Villa and Middlesbrough - let alone standing on the brink of the final. And while Ajax being involved in big European nights may seem like the natural order of things, they had not reached the last eight of the competition since 2003. By beating Juventus they are into the semis for the first time since 1997.

Significantly, this is the first time the club have gone deep in the competition since 2010, when Johan Cruyff and his band of loyal disciples ripped up the Ajax blueprint and started it all over again. The period, which ended with Cruyff’s ousting in 2015, came to be known as the Velvet Revolution, and it was during these years that the seeds for the current success were planted.

This is the story of what a successful reboot looks like.