Football news - Edwin van der Sar quizzed over Manchester United role after Ajax success

The 48-year-old spent six years at United and won four Premier League titles before retiring from football.

However, the legendary goalkeeper has stayed within the game, working at Ajax as a marketing director before being promoted to CEO three years ago.

The Dutch club made it to the quarter-finals of the Champions League last season and Van der Sar has been given much of the credit for their attractive style of football and homegrown squad.

With United conducting a lengthy search for a director of football, the Dutchman's name has been one of those linked with the job.

But Van der Sar, when asked in the build-up to Ajax's clash with Chelsea, insisted he was quite happy to remain in Amsterdam - for now.

"I think I've said it before that I want to make this a success at Ajax," Van der Sar told BT Sport.

"As a goalkeeper and a player, you need to build up confidence in your qualities and your strengths.

"I'm trying that out and experiencing a lot of different things here. We still have some unfinished business here.

"Maybe if we had taken it one step further last year, it would have been the step already but at the moment, I'm concentrating on Ajax."

Ajax's run in the Champions League last year, during which they knocked out Juventus and Real Madrid in consecutive rounds and were unbeaten in two games against Bayern Munich, saw Europe's giants descend on the squad when the summer transfer window opened.

Defender Matthijs de Ligt and midfielder Frenkie de Jong joined Juve and Barcelona respectively but Van der Sar did not lose all his talent.

"That's always been the story of Ajax - the attraction that big clubs have on our players," he added.

"Of course we were sorry that Matthijs and Frenkie went to Barcelona and Juventus but we were very pleased about keeping Hakim Ziyech, [David] Neres, [Andre] Onana and [Nicolas] Tagliafico.

"We managed to give them an upgrade in the contract and also the promise that we would maintain a strong team.

"That's important to players. If they can play in the European scene at the level where we are playing, I think they are more than happy to play at Ajax.

"We don't have the luxury of a big TV contract like England. Our national TV revenue is about £9million so we need to work in a different way. We do that with talented players.

"We give the young players a pathway into the first team so that the future for us and the future for the players is clear.

"Then of course you need the coaching staff and the good quality players to maintain the level that we achieved last year."