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Former Liverpool coach John Heitinga, who left Arne Slot's team in the summer to join Ajax, has been fired just months after taking the role.
"It's a painful decision," technical director Alex Kroes said in a club statement. "But looking back at the past few months, we must conclude that things have turned out quite differently from what we had envisioned. We’ve seen too little progress and have unnecessarily dropped points.
"We know it can take time for a new coach to work with a squad that has undergone changes. We have given John that time, but we believe it’s best for the club to appoint someone else to lead the team.
"We hope to present a new head coach together as soon as possible. We thank John and Marcel for their efforts and wish Fred the best of luck, starting with Sunday’s away match in Utrecht."
After a shaky start to the season, which started with struggling home wins over lowly Telstar, Heracles Almelo, and PEC Zwolle and then draws away at Go Ahead Eagles and FC Volendam, Ajax lost its Champions League opener against Inter Milan.
While that latter result was no disgrace, after a 2-2 draw away at PSV, Ajax played its worst game of the season as it scraped over the line against NAC Breda.
The low point for Heitinga came a couple of days later, when Olympique Marseille handed Ajax their joint-largest Champions League away defeat in a 4-0 demolition.
After that, Ajax won just one of its next seven games (a 3-2 away victory at FC Twente). The final straw came on Wednesday night, when Galatasaray beat Ajax 3-0 in another heavy defeat for the Amsterdam giant.
Ajax is currently fourth in the Eredivisie table, eight points behind Slot's former side, Feyenoord, in first. Last season, under Francesco Farioli, it came one point behind title winner PSV after a late collapse.
In the Champions League this season, only Ajax and Benfica are yet to pick up a point. The Dutch giant has a minus-13 goal difference and is 36th out of the 36 teams in the league phase.
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Former Ajax and Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag, who has been out of work since being fired by Bayer Leverkusen, is one of the names to be put forward as a possible option to return.
Heitinga was replaced by the former Arsenal and Barcelona defender Giovanni van Bronckhorst in the summer.
"I have been here now for a few weeks, but I could sense how big the club is straight away – including when we were in Hong Kong and Tokyo," he said in August. "You could feel Liverpool is well loved there and how many fans we have across the world, even to watch our training sessions."
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