Good Morning Everyone, Garry Monk used the fewest amount of squad players in the entire division - 25 (along with he dog botherers). Sure, I know what you'll say, we didn't have the strength in depth, and obviously most would agree. Here are some other stats relating to our midfield (courtesy of @RightInTheGaryKellys) The best midfield pairing when starting were Eunan O'Kane and Liam Bridcutt who had 100% wins from 5 games. The 2nd best pairing has been Kalvin Phillips and Eunan O'Kane who have a win % of 63% taking 16 pts from 8 games. Bridcutt and Vieira had a win % of 33%, the lowest % was Phillips and Bridcutt who won 14% of their games (7) when starting together. When playing two CM, Leeds have had a total of 10 different midfield pairings, Liam Bridcutt and Ronaldo Vieira the most used (9) I think we'd all agree that our defence did what they were paid to do, and same can be said from our forwards, albeit forward. Therefor is it fair to lay some of the blame on our midfield? Was the stability there? Did Monk know his best midfield? Andrea Radrizzani is to push ahead with plans to secure full control of Leeds Utd from Massimo Cellino this summer. Does that mean we cannot expect any transfer activity until this has been completed? What about Monks future? And the handful of players we would desperately like to keep?
Solid defence behind a shoddy midfield which we all knew, but the chopping and changing wasn't all about injury, there were some shoddy individual performances. Derby, Norwich & Cardiff games demonstrated that we were capable of over running the opposition. our midfield for those games was similar in that Viera was a constant, so too was Hernandez.O'Kane or Bridcutt swapped, Duke played in 2 & Roofe or Sako were in. Too many times though we never got going until the 2nd half after being put to the sword. plus we never got close to the likes of Newcastle or Brighton and struggled against most of the top 6 plus chasers.
Morning Doc, look at the players we have in midfield (and the amount), there's a lot of quality there. To me, I reckon Monk did not know his best midfield!
In Monks defence he changes to the mids were down to form. The youngsters played amazingly well sometimes but lacked the consistency others, personally for me it was the wide men who didn't deliver. I think the frequent changes and guys playing out of position was too damaging. In the run in when we were in on a poor run he should have gone with experience. Dallas and O'kane for me should be starting matches moving another up top with Wood (Doukara is a liability he has a good shot but looses possession all to frequently). As long as he can keep the majority together, all will be good. I would sell Taylor to fund Bartley (possible swap deal???). Let the loanies go and sign; Centre Mid Centre Forward Centre Back. Team Green Ayling
Team ....................Green Ayling.......Barltey............Jannson.......Beradi .....................Bricutt Roofe/Hernandex......................................Dallas ................Henandez/New Mid .............Wood.............New Striker We have some good subs Coyle Farrell Peacock Denton Phillips Viera New Winger Antonnson/Doukara (ideally another new striker)
Morning Ell, Well done on finding the stats for midfield Ell... I know for quite a while I was saying we were getting run over in midfield, our defence soaked up a lot of pressure because of it but did a great job throughout the season. O'Kane should've been playing for most of season imo, he's a good midfielder who also likes to push forward and put pressure on opposing defences, all I can think of is something must've happened between him and Monk; it's interesting to see O'Kane is in the top two pairing stats. Can't understand why he was subbed against Norwich, even Popey and Whelan said he was playing a good game and pushing forward. When Rads first arrived he said he's not here to lose money, also went on to say he understood that some investment would be needed......going to be interesting if Cellino does sell his half. https://www.leedsunited.com/video/83907/andrea-radrizzani-press-conference Article on Rads http://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co....ani-reveals-clear-vision-for-whites-1-8335440
Simon makes a great point about wingers because if Sako could deliver a cross or see a pass we would have won more games as we would have scored more goals. Roofe was pretty good but not a winger, Dallas was ok when Taylor was behind him, Duke is a forward but agree he lost posesion too much, fell over too much. Alphonso I thought was going to rip the league aprt with his strong runs into the box and win loads of penalties, but it didnt happen and he wasnt a great fit into that system. Barrow well wtf was that
Adding this one Ell, hope you don't mind. See Beast Berardi square up to the taller Norwich player http://www.thickaccent.com/2017/05/...ll-dijks-squared-up-to-him-on-saturday-video/
Not sure where you get that idea from Doc,only Newcastle and Huddersfield in the top 12 got more points off us than us them.
Afternoon Simon, not sure on Roofe. Hasn't set the world alight, and a bit lightweight. Bridcut has lost a lot of form since coming back from injury.
Agreed on Bridcutt, but with weak winners and a roaming Hernandez he is exposed. Still think he is a top 10% of players in the Championship. Roofe needs some confidence, has all the skill. Think could be a great foil to Wood if given the time.
I think Roofe should be challenging Pablo for the number 10 spot starting from next season and get a proper winger in to replace him out wide
Afternoon all... Just travelled back from a job in Fulham and I had talk sport on, it was confirmed an hour ago that Angus Kinnear has left West Ham to become our new chief executive a decsison that was made by Rad. When summing up our season, the reporter who is also a Leeds supporter said the problem with Leeds this year is we have too many 6/10 midfielders I'm sure we will all agree on this. He was optimistic that things are going to start moving along very quickly over the next 14 days.
veira is better than a six any day.wide mids were a big problem for us and i think roofe will do well next season.yes we need a good centre mid and another goal scorer .i also think another centre back is a must.bristol have a good one we might go for.the ayling connection might do it.
Ell, wish you'd provided a link. I couldn't find their article. For a start, I don't think it's accurate, and I'm not exactly sure what they're trying to say without reading the article. Having some time available, like you do, I went through every Championship match this season. My results echoes theirs, to a certain extent, but being a lover of stats, I don't approve of using percentages in such a small sample size. I used points won from points available (and gave the percentages too, for comparison). Here goes: 4-2-3-1 Championship Lineups DM Pairing..........Won...Avail...%age Bridcutt/O'Kane....15......15......100% Bridcutt/Phillips......6......18........33% Bridcutt/Viera.......10......30........33% O'Kane/Phillips....16......24........67% O'Kane/Viera.......11......18........61% Phillips/Viera.........9......15........60% There were 11 Championship pairings, not 10. The other 5 were 4-4-2 lineups: DM Pairing............Won...Avail...%age Bridcutt/Hernandez...3.........3......100% Roofe/Viera..............3.........3......100% Hernandez/Phillips...1.........3........33% Hernandez/Viera......0.........3..........0% Diagouraga/Viera.....0.........3..........0% Now if you play about with stats, you can prove anything. Having this data, I was interested to look at stability. I was convinced that our longest back to back pairing was 2 matches. I was almost right. There are 2 exceptions: Bridcutt/Viera - 3 games in March/April. We got 4 points out of 7. O'Kane/Phillips - 5 games in Sept/Oct. We got 7 points out of 15. So much for stability. All it brought us was mediocrity. I then looked at individual runs in the team. There were 3 of note: Bridcutt - 7 games, Feb thru April. We got 11 points out of 21 (52%). Bridcutt - 9 games in Dec thru Feb. We got 16 points out of 27(59%). O'Kane - 11 games in Sep thru Nov. We got 25 points out of 36 (69%). And finally, I looked at the individual start records of the DMs: Viera: 33 points from 24 matches (46%) Bridcutt: 34 points from 22 matches (52%) Phillips: 32 points from 20 matches (53%) O'Kane: 42 points in 19 matches (74%) From this, the obvious talking point is O'Kane's record being about 50% higher than all of the others, but there's another trend that should grab your attention - the kids played as many, if not more than the experienced DMs. Is this a good thing? Was it too much too soon? A major factor in our season fade? One thing's for sure - O'Kane's a keeper!