Good Morning. It's Wednesday 23rd March, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road Barca agree personal terms with Raphinha Several media sources are reporting that Raphinha has already agreed a five-year deal to join Barcelona. The Spanish Giants are set to lose Ousmane Dembele this Summer, and see the Brazilian as an ideal replacement. Leeds have been trying in vain to persuade Raphinha (and his agent Deco) to sign new and improved terms at Elland Road, but despite positive spin, their effort look to be in vain. Deco is not only Raphinha's agent, but he is employed by Barcelona as their chief South American scout; surely a conflict of interest! Reports suggest Barca are pushing hard for €35 million (29 m pounds) to be accepted, though surely that's never going to happen! Leeds only have themselves to blame. Their lack of interest to improve an ageing squad which relies heavily on peak physical conditioning has left them fighting a scrappy relegation fight, from which few will survive to see next season. please log in to view this image Wolves just could not deal with chaotic Leeds Football pundit Mark Lawrenson believes that Wolves were just unable to deal with the chaos that is Leeds Utd. The 64yo former Liverpool defender believes that Bruno Lage's team are used to a more traditional and calculated approach from their opposition, so when Leeds turned up in the second half, they 'completely lost it!' “It was chaos wasn’t it? That’s watching Leeds - that’s what happens. Everybody tunes in to watch them because it’s either up or down and they play exactly the same way. The problem that Wolves had - they’ve been so calculated under the manager, they completely lost it. It’s as though the way that Leeds played affected them in the end. I know they were down to 10 men but what a fabulous watch.” please log in to view this image Marsch recognises commitment and efforts from support staff In a recent Interview, Jesse Marsch sung the praises of the team’s support staff, recognising the commitment and efforts they make at Thorp Arch. He spoke of their positive attitudes and feel good mentality, which make a huge difference when things are not going as well as they could on the field! “I heard from Victor, and from Angus, before I came about how good the young men are and not just that, how incredibly selfless the workers around the team are in the training centre and inside the club,” “From the first day, I could feel that, I can feel the positive energy and I'm just really thankful to be here. “The mentality of the group is really strong, really strong with everything they've been through this year, it's amazing. So, we have more work to do. We have to enjoy moments like this. I learned this in football, if you're only focused on every result, you have to enjoy moments. “So we tried to enjoy also the last result [and] we'll enjoy this one, but then we'll get back to work and we'll try to get better so we can continue to control our own destiny.” please log in to view this image Casilla to return to ER Kiko Casilla could return to Leeds this Summer! The 35yo has been on loan at La Liga outfit Elche this season, but after a promising start, the former Real Madrid shot stopper fell out of favour and has not featured since October. He signed a four and a half year deal at Elland Road back in the 2019 January transfer window, meaning he is contracted until the Summer of 2023. please log in to view this image
Morning all The YEP are dismissing reports that Raphinha has a buy out clause and they also state no offer has been made by Barcelona. I guess as we approach the end of the season we’ll be getting the usual click bait rubbish. I read this morning Villa want Phillips, no disrespect to Villa but there chances of regular European football are not much better than ours. Lots of players we’ve half forgotten about will be due back from loans, I think Costa is another that’s fell out of favour. The rebuild required, it’s going to take some funding so I’m expecting to lose one maybe two first tam players, Raphinha I’d be sad about but would understand. If we can fund a decent signing by selling Rodrigo, Firpo and Llorente I’d be fine.
Kiko back ........either pay him off or use him as target practice ffs.......as for raph he is now looking at a world cup place and probably feels Barca gives him more certain champs league sorties, we need to make sure we get the right cash and not fall for some smooth talking senor
Lazy journo’s, international break, no footy on telly, and everyone wants to rubbish Leeds. Barcelona are only signing freebies, so cannot afford to pay a transfer fee. They also need to offload a player for every player coming in on top of reducing their wage bill. So far we already know of 4 free players that have signed contract agreements with them, which means at least 4 have got to leave. Phil Hay did an Athletic piece stating 2 full back, a midfielder and a striker required. So of course we see clickbait shyt. Big problems with loan players, Edmondson, Poveda, Bogusz, Kiko, Costa, Davies and even Drameh depending on how we deal with him. I suspect we will see deals done to offload most
Raphinha and Rodrigo looked like they caused the changing room revolt even by the way they were playing. They can go for me. Trouble causers. They can take Firpo and Llorente with them. You can't have a split changing room in pro sport. Get rid of the ones that do it. Once they do it once they can do it again.
Apparently if Rapha is to leave then there is a minimum fee involved, this is reported to be £70 mil, and so if we get that then, we go again. Kiko coming back wouldn't be the end of the world as long as he doesn't get to play for us again. But what about Shammers requiring £150 mil for rice? Would we let Kalvin go for that or a bit more?
The unfortunate thing that ghe media started was that Bielsa couldnt speak English. Wrong, he spoke good enough English, French, Portuguese, Spanish and bits of German. He refused to speak English to our media in case he made a mistake and was misrepresented. In other words he didnt trust English media. Ever notice the number of times he pulled up his interpreter for not translating the question or the answer properly. Funny to see
If Raphinha's going which looks certain, then I hope je goes abroad. Allegedly part of his sulk is the amount of the release clause in his contract, we'll he signed the ****er. Now the pessimist in me thinks the difference in the figures from us being in the PL to the Championship is apparently £47m, part of why he's not been trying, less fee more signing on figure ???
Afternoon all, So with the talk of offloading Llorente it got me thinking about the CB position. At the moment we have an abundance of CBS for two spots. Out of them all who would you let leave and who would you keep? For me, next season, I would like to see Koch and Struijk as the first choice pairing with Cooper and Cresswell as the back up. I would send Hjelde out on loan and sell on Llorente. Nothing against him as such but he has too many crazy moments which worry me. I have more faith in the others.
200 m for Phillips, and Raphinha, and start the rebuilding process (with a big party for all the long suffering Not606ers at Gessa's house)
If Rice is worth £150 mil then Kalvin should be worth £200 mil. So if we get £200 mil for Kalvin and £200 mil for Raphinha with a 35% sell on clause, then I say sell them But to be serious, if we sell any of them for less than £80 mil each I will be very disappointed
I have seen that some is claiming that Raphinha has agreed personal terms with Liverpool. And that Kalvin is going to West Ham if Rice is leaving. The rumor mill is really starting up now.
