The #LUFC Breakfast Debate (Monday 15th March)

Leeds keeping tabs on Allegri

According to the Times Sports journalist Duncan Castles, Leeds have made an approach for Massimiliano Allegri.

The 53yo has an impressive CV. He has won the Italian league with both AC Milan and Juventus. He left the Allianz Stadium at the end of their 2018-19 season after five years in charge.

According to Italian daily Corriere della Sera, Allegri already has agreed on a deal in principle to join a top club in the Premier League in the summer and has also been taking English classes.

Obviously much will depend on Bielsa, and whether the Argentine decides to extend his contract for another season. At 65, he has definitely got a few more years in him, but has the financial security to retire and enjoy life with his family.

A separate reports states that Leeds are also keeping tabs on Savilla Manager Julen Lopetegui.

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Old rivalry ends in stalemate

The intense rivalry between Leeds and Chelsea was reignited for the first time since 2003 (at Elland Road) on Saturday lunch time. Leeds skipper Liam Cooper was ill, so the Captains armband was given to Ayling, and Pascal Struijk was recalled (after injury) to the starting line up, partnering Diego Llorente at centre back. Chelsea were on an undefeated run of eleven and although the Whites had lost five out of seven, it was Bielsa's team that were out the traps the quickest.

Early on, Raphinha's through ball found Bamford down the right wing. His cut back gave Roberts a tap in at the far past. Unfortunately Leeds leading scorer was offside. Moments later Leeds enjoyed a rare slice of luck. Ayling's attempted clearance from his own box, hit Llorente. The ball cannoned off the Spanish International, looping towards a stranded Meslier. The woodwork came to Leeds rescue, and the ball bounced into the grateful arms of the french man.

It was then Chelsea's turn to enjoy a lucky break. Roberts exquisite chip left Mendy flat footed. The ball clipped the underside of the bar and away to safety. The Senegalese shot stoppers desperate attempt to make amends could have easily resulted in an own goal; reminiscent of Adama Traore's effort for Wolves recently that hit the crossbar and in off Meslier.

It wasn't all one way traffic, Chelsea enjoyed their fair share of efforts, though on the whole Meslier was not stretched.

Leeds continued to have the lions share of the chances, but with Leeds leading scorer injured in the first half, the game finished in stalemate.

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Bamfords injury blow

Patrick Bamford's 100th appearance for the club ended prematurely. The England hopeful suffered a leg injury following a challenge with Antonio Rudiger. Although Leeds leading scorer soldiered on for the next five minutes; he was obviously in discomfort, and was replaced by Rodrigo with 10 minutes of the first half remaining.

With 13 goals to his name, Bamford has become relied upon this season to find the back of the net. Only Harrison (6) and Dallas / Raphinha (5 each) have shown consistency in front of goal.

Bamford, Raphinha and Klich all lead the way with five assists each!

Reports from the weekend indicate that Bamfords injury is not as serious as first thought. He has a dead leg, and should be available for Fridays trip to Craven Cottage.

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Morning all

Good news on Bamfords injury, hard to discuss next seasons coach when we don’t know what Bielsa is doing. Surely any targets we’re looking at have been okayed by Bielsa? No point lining anyone expensive up if he’s not staying. I’m confident he’ll be here next season

Special mention too for Ortas enthusiasm on Saturday and how he unsettled and rattled the Chelsea manager

 

Morning all

Bielsa will still be here next season to look after phase 3 of his project, unless someone in the Board upset him. He has 10 games to complete phase 2 and he is already planning for the next season. The media are now trying to link the club to every top manager in World football, simply because we got one of the best last time. Allegri is no doubt in the top 5 or 10 best in the world, so expect us being linked to Conte as well rather than Warnock and Big Sam. But when the time comes keep your eyes on Jorge Sampoali the new Marseille manager who has already transformed their style and flair and have won both matches convincingly since he took over and it seems the players are loving it.

Great result at the weekend and a very important point a solid defence without Cooper against the best team we’ve played so far and the most expensive team assembled so far. Struijk and Llorente Meslier and Phillips all deserve high praise Ayling and Dallas did a job but we lacked the ball so didnt get to use our flair players and attack. On that showing we will take the odd point from the 5 really tough games we have left, as well as take a lot more from the easier games

 

On another subject, did anyone hear the comments yesterday about Heckingbottom taking over the first team at the Blunts. He had to wait until all the testing and waiting periods was over before he could meet his team, which was Saturday. My understanding is that most clubs are doing the same and what Leeds does is unique. We have a big bubble and a small bubble. The big bubble is first team and most of the U23s which is around 40 players. The smaller bubble consists of mainly U18s, 17, 16s etc. Bielsa needs players to step up to the 1st team and play against the first team and play exactly the same way. So need to be available all the time

 

1pm kick off

 

If anyone wants to see Koch, tune in at 1pm

 

We’ve been starved of the benefits of our cheap Innuendo machine for a few months... good to see that it’s now oiled up and ready to rise to the occasion.

 

Had to cut and paste this because of the amount of spam and adverts. But brilliant read

English football is finally becoming acquainted with the unique geniusof Marcelo Bielsa.

His ideas, borrowed and adapted, have become part of the game here, but the man himself did not arrive on these shores until 2018 to make Leeds United a force again and end their 16-year exile outside of the top flight.

But it’s not the first time a Bielsa side has given the champions of England a shock to the system. Back in 2012, his Athletic Bilbao side unforgettably knocked Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United out of the Europa League, beating them home and away, 5-3 on aggregate. This was the time Pep said he thinks that we are in the presence of the worlds greatest coach.
Old Trafford
Around 8000 Athletic supporters made the trip to Manchester, with 6500 packed into the stands, more for the occasion and rare chance to visit Old Trafford as opposed to any real anticipation of getting a result.
Missed chances
What will no doubt be a familiar feeling to anyone that’s watched Bielsa’s Leeds over the past two years in the Championship, Athletic created chance after chance after chance but struggled to provide the final touch. Buzzing around Ferguson’s men with the kind of constant, relentless movement that could only have been learned from Bielsa’s infamously gruelling Murderball training exercise, Athletic completely dominated at Old Trafford, pressing high and carving openings – often sending up to six men stampeding into United’s box.
“At times Barcelona can make you look silly because they keep the ball so well,” said Ryan Giggs after United were beaten 2-0 in the 2009 Champions League final. “At times we maybe chased it and didn’t keep our shape as we should have.”

It was a similar story against Athletic, who went to Manchester and recorded 61% possession by half-time (57.8% over 90 minutes), outworking and outpassing the hosts.

They did that while responding to the early setback of a 22nd-minute Wayne Rooney goal, scored against the run of play, after spurned chances from an Athletic side that came racing out of the blocks.
Getting what they deserved
Were it not for profligate finishing and an excellent performance from David de Gea, Bielsa’s men might have scored three or four by the time they finally did get back on level terms, through Llorente on the stroke of half-time.

The striker worked diligently to provide a focal point and was rewarded for holding up the ball, laying it off before making his way into the six-yard box – by which point Markel Susaeta had received it on the overlap and sent it in at the perfect height for Llorente to head in.
The hosts might not have been at full-strength, with Rio Ferdinand, Paul Scholes, Michael Carrick and Danny Welbeck rested, but it was still a strong side featuring De Gea, Rafael, Patrice Evra, Chris Smalling, a Phil Jones that was still highly-rated back then, Giggs, Park Ji-Sung, with Rooney alongside Javier Hernandez in attack.

Ferguson will no doubt have subjected his players to the infamous hairdryer at the break, having seen them distinctly second best.

But it made no difference as Athletic remained on top in the second half, while introducing Carrick and Anderson early on failed to give them the foothold they so desperately lacked, looking suffocated by the visitors’ almost militaristic man-marking job.
Their pressure told for a second time, giving them a well-deserved lead in the 71st minute, Susaeta playing in Oscar De Marcos with a deftly-chipped through ball.

With two away goals and a lead to protect, they didn’t drop back, and instead just kept attacking as they did in the first minute.

That endeavour was remunerated as Iker Muniain pounced after De Gea parried out a shot from De Marcos – their 10th on target – sprinting ahead of Rafael to slot home in injury time, sending the sizeable travelling contingent into delirium.

United’s Brazilian full-back was in position to clear the ball but stood dawdling, understandably punch-drunk after being pressed by Bielsa’s pack of wild dogs for 90 minutes.
There’d be more late drama as Rooney stepped up to score a 92nd-minute penalty, making it 3-2 on the night, giving them an unwarranted foothold in the tie, punishing an inexplicable handball from De Marcos.

But the second leg at the Sam Mames was much the same story. Total commitment and energetic pressing from Athletic. Eighteen shots to United’s two, a 2-1 win, another late consolation from Rooney.

An indelible mark
“It was an outstanding performance by them, not only in their ability, but their energy was unbelievable,” Ferguson commented post-match.

“The highest stats of any team that has played at Old Trafford in the last 10 years, in terms of the distance run. That is great credit to the desire of the team.”

“I remember speaking to our analyst after that game. He said he had to look at the stats three times to believe them. They were off the scale,” Gary Neville later recalled.

“He’d never seen anything like it at Old Trafford.”

But the United coaches weren’t the only ones left stunned by Athletic’s performances, earning Bielsa cult hero status among Athletic’s vociferous support – like with Newell’s, fans have been known to make the pilgrimage to see his latest project at Leeds – and fawning praise from the British press.

“Bilbao put on a performance that has seldom been equalled by an away team at Old Trafford, blowing the hosts apart,” wrote The Guardian’s Paul Doyle.

“The champions of England were embarrassed by the superior work-rate, passing, movement and finishing of the fifth-placed team in Spain,” quipped Henry Winter in The Telegraph.

“The Argentine has breathed new life into the Basque club and its fervent support can continue to dream that their 28-year trophy drought may be about to end,” suggested Jonathan Jurejko on the BBC’s match report.

It wasn’t to be in the end, as Athletic failed to replicate their best as they lost cup finals to Barcelona and Atletico Madrid that year, but few will forget one of the best performances in the club’s history.

 

We did very well on Saturday, imagine we kept a clean sheet with Alioski at LB. He scares the crap out of me every time he gets the ball, or it ends up in his vicinity. Strange to see Rodrigo being substituted, I thought he was doing well. It seems Bielsa reckoned he'd done enough at that stage.

 

Newcastle's No 8 is about the same height as Shako....

 

Afternoon all,

Good point Saturday and could have been more.

Going into this game the two biggest question marks hung over Roberts & Costa. I think both gave good answers. Roberts really came into own as the game went on and rightfully picked up the MOM award.
Roberts has been unlucky in the last two games to have goals disallowed for offside. The important thing for me is he is clearly getting in the right positions and getting his shots on target. The goals will come if he can keep going like that, it was only Mendy's long fingers that stopped him scoring a great goal this week.

Costa looked good when he came on. He got past Chilwell a few times and created problems on the left.

If both can keep these kind of performances up then we have a problem, of the good kind, in the summer when it comes to deciding on outgoings.




Another who impressed me was Struijk. He has come on leaps and bounds this season and really makes our CB posisition look strong.

 

Are you watching the juniors?

 

Leeds 2-1 Newcastle

A game of 2 halves with Leeds dominating the first 40 mins with assured and good performances from Koch, Berardi and Poveda and some great play from Gelhardt, Greenwood, Cresswell and Drameh
Gelhardt scaring them to death and should have had 2 penalties but he got one and also took it himself for 1-0 then Gelhardt dribbled the ball all through the Newcastle defence forcing a corner and Poveda provided the ammo for a Cresswell headed goal 2-0. Then a silly 5 minutes allowed them to score 2-1 half time.

second half we were second best and second to every ball. Some exceptions were Gelhardt, Caprile in goal, Cresswell, Drameh. We smaybe should have scored more but no final ball. Casey replaced Berardi at CB, Shackelton replaced Koch who played DM and McKinstry replaced Poveda. All the first team lads played well including Shacks, but disappointed for Huggins MCCarron McKinstry, Jenkins

man of the match by far was Gelhardt with Drameh and Creswell close behind

 

Leeds Live marked all the players with the best being Drameh, Caprile, Cresswell and :
Joe Gelhardt - 9/10
Proper centre-forwards fashion goalscoring chances out of nothing and Joe Gelhardt was no different from that today. Leaning his body into two challenges inside the penalty area in the first half, he saw penalty appeals waved away in the first instance, before securing a spot-kick with his second attempt.

 

Last week Marcelo Bielsa said he had concerns about the up and coming Internationals and the following day South America canceled all fixtures. Bielsa’s concern is that at this moment in time it seems crazy to send players out of gheir covid bubbles and into new bubbles and then to have the players spending at least 10 days in quarantine, so players would become unavailable for 3 or 4 weeks as they would then need to be match fit before selected again.so Bielsa has said what many sane people think.

Llorente has been selected for Spain but Rodrigo hasnt because he isnt fit yet. Meslier has been selected for France U21, Roberts has been selected to a 30-man squad and so it will go on.....

i will be Royally fked off if we lose any players for our run-in and especially if it effects the overall league position. Yes we should all strive to represent our country but when a Pandemic is around and player safety is key and especially for Leeds when we need to secure our league status. Dont be selfish twats, think about your families, your team mates, your employer and your loyal fans. Tell ‘em to fk off and come back when its all over

 

Did he hang out with Ken Dodd too?

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Roger is on the nest tonight lads.

Kenya have just beat Tanzania 2-1

 

This covid lockdown has done one thing to us all. Now we are all Plastics and watch via the screen of our choice.
Before we had comments such as you don't see the game as i do because i attend the games. We are all relying on the broadcaster for our coverage. So we all see the same but end up with different opinions of players.
Players like Roberts are seen with all their flaws because he is up front at the glory end. So it's natural to see more of him. In this day and technical age why can we not have an option to see a fixed view of the pitch. It could be an option to have a small screen avaliable. Then we could all see as plastics what the elite see that us plebs cannot.

 

I'm sure I've had a beer with them.

 

Wonder if Wolves are happy with the cash they got for Jota now