Good Morning. It's Monday 22nd May, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road Irons hammer final nail in Leeds coffin West Ham recovered after falling behind, to thump Leeds all the way back to the Championship - barring a miracle. Lady luck has been in short supply at LS11 this season; that's not to say they don't deserve to be in their present predicament. They have been incompetent, disorganised, unstable, lack composure, and are completely devoid of Northern grit, synonymously associated with our great club, in years gone by. Leeds started the better, and deservedly took the lead after 17 minutes. Rodrigo latched on to Weston McKennie's long throw, volleying home from 15 yards. They managed to stay ahead for 15 minutes until the inevitable happened. Bowen's deep cross found Declan Rice in acres of space. His first time effort (into the ground) deceived Robles before nestling kindly in the back of the net. The visitors took the lead with 20 minutes left on the clock. Ing's threaded a delightful ball into Bowen's path, slicing open the Leeds defence. The former Hull man then calmly side footed his effort past Robles' despairing dive. To add insult to to injury, Lanzini added a third in injury time. please log in to view this image Radz puts together rescue bid for Sampdoria, possibly indicating ER exit Gestio Capital, an asset management fund of which Andrea Radrizzani is a part, have put together a binding rescue bid to save Sampdoria from extinction. Whilst financial oblivion may have suddenly become more of an attractive proposition for the Serie A outfit, their creditors are in full support of the takeover. The Genoa based outfit face having to start over at the bottom of the Italian football pyramid, unless they can avoid bankruptcy. The consortium have put together an immediate injection of £47.8m (€55million), with more funds prepared for their rebuilding process. Why does this leave Leeds? Has Radz agreed to sell his remaining shared to the 49ers? Have they reached a revised agreement on the fee; and if so, how long will it all take? please log in to view this image
Morning all. Not much to say that hasn't already been said. As for Sampdoria, lads you'd be just as well going out of existence, Radz will ensure there's a fate worst than extinction awaiting you
It's not been a lack of funds, and certainly not trying different coaches, it all boils down to the poor quality players, bought by very poor recruitment, i personally am sure unless we somehow have a clear out , although i don't know how with some of the stupididly long contracts we have handed out. Will a positive investment, of multi multi millions be coming in from the 49'rs alone if radz does go, i don't think so. My conclusion next Sunday will be a very sad day for our Club, and for the reasons above we will not be doing a Burnley either, like some of you hope. All i can advise, is to prepare yourselves for once again, a long time in the wilderness. Unlike a lot of you i think Sam would be the best we could attract for the championship, and with his experience (given the right funding) would get us back up, unfortunatly how deep are the 49'rs pockets. we have built quality teems in the past, on a very limited budget, just look at our old league one club, under Grayson, with no more than a couple of tweeks we would have been playing premier league football a lot earlier, so just pointing out it can be done. So not all doom and gloom, might just take a while though.
Can't believe we are where we are, after such a rosy future was on the cards a couple of seasons ago. I bet Everton and their fan's can't believe that no matter how sh** the have been, Leeds have been even worse, they have been very lucky indeed, any other season, with any other team involved and they would have been down, with Southampton and Leicester.
Are we doing last rites today? Or are we hovering around the carcass for another week, just to make sure it's not just in a deep sleep. Could be humming by next Monday, mind
We're as good as down now so looking onto next season there are three things that need to be sorted quickly before we even look at the squad. 1) Ownership 2) Director of Football 3) Manager That said, based on needing two players for each position, we'd need 8 or 9 as things stand and that's before replacing those that will leave. I just can't see how we manage that kind of turnover. If we rely on making up the squad with large parts of the youth team we won't achieve anything, as we've seen in the past, the majority of those who are too good for the under 21's, still struggle in the Championship. I'm looking forward to Elland Road turning toxic next week and the board getting what they deserve, it's just a shame Orta won't be there to take it.
There is sooooo much to unpack, going back to the sacking of Bielsa ... that was the moment everything changed dramatically ... what a fk up anyone keen on jumping on a pod with me to discuss?
Pep Guardiola brought Erling Haaland on for 15 minutes at the end of a meaningless game yesterday. With a champions league final a few weeks away, will he play him and other key players in the next two matches? Discuss.
Seems a good thing to do now, keep his match fitness up. If he gets injured in one of those meaningless games and they lose one or both of the finals it will be Pep's fault
Morning all. I'm still in shock at yesterday's performance as we had a full week to prepare and that's all the effort we could muster plus where were the crunching tackles and total commitment of the previous game against Newcastle ? Did we even get a yellow card as I can't remember anyone getting stuck in at all. At 1-0 up we had to fight with everything we had to protect that lead and we just rolled over. WTF didn't Bamford go down if he was injured and get them to kick the ball out, where the f*ck was Struijk while Bowen was running through into our box down his wing, why were all our defenders drawn to the front post (again), where was the desire, the fight, the foul, anything to break up play and reset. Weak and pathetic are the phrases that spring to mind as we capitulated when it mattered the most. Of course West Ham were going to up their game when we scored and we had to be ready for that with men behind the ball and defend for our lives but we didn't do any of that. Outnumbered at the back post for the 100th time this season so their player can score from 6 yards out unchallenged. Second half nothing and apparently nothing in the tank either as we just became worse as the game wore on, flat and devoid of any energy whatsoever as we allowed West Ham to showboat and pass it around like a training game for f*cks sake. Total embarrassment and would have rather gone down with a red card or two and fighting than having to witness that. Message to Radz...hey Radz, that's what you get from players when you employ lesser coaches who don't set the tone in training all week and every week. We've gone from the players dreading Bielsa's murderball, extra training when we lost and getting weighed every day to a bunch of spineless, unfit and whinging rabble.
Just on our manager/coach for next season. Burnley got lucky when they appointed Vincent Kompany as it could easily not have worked out given his previous managerial record in Belgium. One of the main things though was he was a 'name' and could attract half decent players to come and play for him. Best we can probably hope for now is 'Stevie G' so probably best to start preparing for a few seasons as also rans in the Championship. Also noted that Coberan's season petered out and even Carrick who was getting all the praise at Boro didn't quite do enough this time but will probably improve next. Wilder stank the place out at Watford as well. Difficult division the Championship as we all know too well.
If we go down, we should also take the opportunity to rebuild the stadium and facilities as well, assuming appropriate takeover is in place.
Indeed jambo. Burnley took a smart punt on Kompany. He’s a likeable, intelligent, well connected guy. He didn’t really pull big names in though.. just guys he felt could do a job. He’s done a fantastic job there. The other guys? Corboran and carrick took over good playing squads who were playing well without getting results. They were the two easiest jobs in football in my view. But both ultimately failed to get their sides up. Boro at least made the play offs. A guy like wilder needs time to build a style of play in my view. This trouble-shooting idea that chairmen get mid season when they’re not happy? Doesn't often work.. and when it does who’s to say the pick up wasn’t going to come anyway. Study xg and these things are easier to see
Heckingbottom took his sacking in good grace but bet he’s peeing himself today Ashe waves us bye bye on his way up to the prem
