Marco van Basten suffered a losing start to his coaching career at Ajax after they conceded a half-time lead to fall to a 2-1 defeat at Willem II.

Taking charge of his first game since leaving the Holland manager's job following Euro 2008, Van Basten saw one of his summer signings, Miralem Sulejmani, open the scoring in the 22nd minute.

The Amsterdammers could have had more than Sulejmani's strike to show for a dominant opening period and they were made to pay for their profligacy as second-half goals from Frank Demouge and Mehmet Akgun consigned Van Basten, and his new-look Ajax team, to defeat.

The 43-year-old coach's day was soured further when Evander Sno, another new face at Ajax this season, was shown a straight red card six minutes from time.

PSV Eindhoven got their Eredivisie title defence off to a flying start with a 5-1 thrashing of FC Utrecht.

Although it took them until the 42nd minute to break the deadlock through Ibrahim Afellay's goal, the floodgates opened soon after as Nordin Amrabat and Danny Koevermans made it 3-0 before half-time and Afellay added another soon after the break.

Koevermans then added his second and PSV's fifth 13 minutes from time. Rafael Uiterloo scored in the 90th minute but it was scant consolation for the hosts.

Steve McClaren's FC Twente bounced back from being knocked out of the Champions League by Arsenal to earn a deserved point after a 1-1 draw at Roda JC in their season-opener.

Eljero Elia put the visitors ahead but Andres Oper came off the bench to grab a late leveller for Roda.

In the day's other game, late goals from Rutger Worm - who was sent-off after collecting a second yellow card for over-celebrating - and Mark Otten enabled NEC Nijmegen to beat De Graafschap 2-0

FC Groningen got the new season off to a roaring start as they humiliated 10-man Vitesse Arnhem 4-0 on Friday.

Sepp De Roover gave Groningen the lead in the 10th minute and a completely one-sided second half saw Koen Van de Laak double the visitors' lead from the spot after Frank van der Struijk was given his marching orders in the 68th minute.

Marcus Berg extended their lead with another penalty five minutes later before Evgeniy Levchenko added a fourth 12 minutes from time.