Good Morning. It's Monday 16th January, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road Luckless Leeds lose at Villa Park Luckless Leeds returned from the West Midlands with nothing to show for their endeavors, as the noose begins to tighten on Jesse Marsch's tenure. Things could have been very different had lady luck shone on the visitors, but when you're fighting for your lives at the wrong end of the table, decisions rarely go your way. A goal line clearance, a World class save and a marginal offside decision was the difference between defeat and victory on Friday night, and even though the stats show Leeds had the better chances (16 shots to 11 and 11 corners to 0, both in favour of Leeds), the only data that actually matters was the actual scoreline. Leeds don't help themselves. They know they're vulnerable to the counter attack, and it only took Villa three minutes to expose their frailties. Leeds corner was cleared by Ashley Young, allowing Kamara a clear run from one end of the pitch to the other. He released Lion Bailey on the right side of penalty area. He took a couple of touches before firing past Meslier, into the far corner of the goal. Bailey inadvertently set up their second, shortly after the hour mark. His darting run at goal, was finished off with a thunderbolt, which Meslier could only parry into the path of Buendia, who gratefully headed home from close range. Leeds were finally rewarded for their hard work with seven minutes remaining. Gnonto picked up the ball in midfield, turned his man, and made a darting run down the left wing. He skipped several challenges before looking up and picking out Bamford, 10 yards from goal. He may be a little ring rusty, but he doesn't miss from there. Unfortunately, it was too little, too late, and Villa held on to the win! please log in to view this image Will Marsch learn by his mistakes before its too late You don't have to be a Pep Guardiola to expose Leeds frailties and stop the cogs from turning; in fact I suspect, even a Millwall fan could tell you! Leeds continue to get punished on the counter attack time and time again, and they're not learning from it; and when they start to gain momentum, all the opposition have to do is to break up play, and Leeds fall like a pack of cards. Taking the reigns from Bielsa was always going to be a difficult task Almost twelve months on, fans are a lot less forgiving of Marsch than they were of his predecessor. Flashbacks of how close we came to relegation, still haunts us all, which has left the Leeds faithful unsympathetic to Marsch's cause. According to Phil Hay: "There is a formula to scoring against Leeds and whether Marsch thinks so or not, there was no watching Villa’s opening goal and avoiding the thought that everyone watching had seen the dance before. It was a Leeds corner that did it, their chance to attack and their Kryptonite, the high-line positions where numbers count against them and counters murder them." "Villa worked their way out, Boubacar Kamara carried possession towards a defence low on bodies and Leon Bailey stepped inside Pascal Struijk to wrap his left foot around the ball and find the far corner. The shades of colour vary slightly but that was the concession, the one that always lurks in the shadows." "It sums up where Leeds are mentally, telling themselves that at some stage this will turn or turn and stick to a degree which consolidates Marsch’s precarious-looking job. They were better than Villa and more joined up than Villa, allowing for the fact Emery is newly in the door in Birmingham." "The press was hungry and coordinated and it left an onlooker conflicted, picking over a side who are a soft touch in some moments but hard to live with in others. It is only fair, in criticising Marsch, to acknowledge the points where he is being kicked where it hurts by the distribution of fortune and last night was one of those." please log in to view this image Bookies see Leeds surviving the drop Even after their latest defeat, leading bookmakers Bet365 believe Leeds have enough in the tank, to finish above the drop zone. Recent results have not been kind to the Whites, though they continue to be competitive, and fight for every point. Come May, their determination may just be enough to keep them above water, and the Bookies agree. Bournemouth (1/3), Everton (8/11) and Southampton (4/5) make up the favourites for the drop, whilst Wolves (9/4), Nottingham Forest 12/5 and Leicester City (11/4) are all ahead of Leeds (7/2), all fighting to stay up. please log in to view this image
… the bookies are rarely wrong Actually because it’s critical to their business model they take it all pretty seriously. So when they look at their models they don’t just look at the table… they look at how teams are playing, xg etc.
Morning all. My thoughts during Friday night's game were that we have a soft underbelly and for all our pressing and attacking venom we're pretty easy to finish off. Defenders backing off, plus a lack of tactical fouls by midfielders just adds to the feeling that we're not capable of winning games unless we score 4 goals or more. This has to change, we all know it has to change and the only way to change it is to get nasty and stop being so damn nice.
As soon as Villa got into trouble, they hoofed the ball. We always tried to play our way out of trouble, and were caught in possession may times. Whats wrong with hoofing the ball?
But you've always been nasty. What are you going to resort to now. Morning all btw. Just looking for ward to start of new season here on Wednesday
No more Mr Nice Guy. Aaronson should have fouled their player runnning with the ball for the first goal...instead he let him come inside him (ooh err missus) and then promptly fell on his arse. For the second Struijk could have knobbled their player on the edge of the box but instead dangled a leg and let him come inside (again). We're soft...soft as **** and also a bit gay it would seem.
Aaronson needs to get some confidence back. His problem is that he fluffed and squandered quite a few chances in his last 3 games. Chances he usually takes and you could visibly see his head drop when he missed his 2nd chance on Friday. Right now he doesn’t look anywhere near as good as Gallagher the player he was meant to be like. Feel for him but he was our record signing before Rutter. As far as Marsch is concerned we can all see what needs to happen and he needs to sort it fast. Our defenders are taking the blame every game and for me that’s not fair
Everything. It stinks of panic. I’ve seen countless times when we’ve been under the cosh Leeds players (Greenwood seems the worst one for this) when they’ve regained possession, instead of finding a teammate with an easy pass, simply hoof it back to the opposition so inviting yet more pressure. For a counter-attacking team, that’s just criminal. Leeds need to calm down, and players also need to show themselves more to provide an outlet.
If you could change one player from this season who would it be ? For me it has to be Robin Koch...far too slow both in the legs and the head and what exactly did he do to deserve getting in front of Llorente this season. As far as I can remember he got the position by default as Cooper was out injured, but since then he's done nothing to justify his continued selection. In fact you could argue that Charlie Cresswell wouldn't have done any worse and he might very well have done better. So Koch out for me...and he can take Struijk to sit on the bench with him as well
Yes that's true. Should have been for a few games though and not half a season. Good player to have on the bench, as he covers a few positions, but currently not good enough to start in any of them.
