The #LUFC Breakfast Debate (Monday 6th February)

Good Morning. It's Monday 6th March, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road

Leeds feeling the Blues after latest defeat

Wesley Fofana's first ever goal for Chelsea heaped more pressure on Leeds, whose miserable season just keeps on getting worse. To their credit, they battled hard, and were competitive throughout the game, though never looked like scoring.

In front of goal, Leeds looked amateur at best. Their best effort, came in injury time courtesy of shot stopper Illan Meslier. His goalward header (from a corner) at least tested Arrizabalaga's reflexes before gratefully landing in his arms.

Chelsea were poor, they even got booed off at half time, yet they had the lions share of the chances, in the first 45 minutes. Meslier pulled off a blinding save from Havertz from a one on one situation, Joao Felix rocked the woodwork from the edge of the area and Chilwell, should have done a lot better from an opportunity he had just before the interview.

The only goal of the game came in the 53rd minute from an out swinging corner. Meslier got caught in no mans land, after changing his mind to come, giving Fofana an empty net, once he out jumped his markers.

Although they battled hard, Leeds showed all the creativity of a digestive biscuit. Their set pieces were woeful, their crossing was poor, and in front of goal, it was just embarrassing. It's going to take something special to stay up.

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Were we right to get rid of Marsch

Javi Gracia faces a monumental task in keeping Leeds up this season after yet another inept performance from the weekend. They worked hard and were competitive, but are prone to errors, and never looked like scoring. It's like the wheels are turning, but the cogs are missing.

On paper, when you look at the Leeds squad, they should not be in this predicament, especially after spending close to £150m on players in the last nine months. Sacking, and replacing Managers comes at a huge cost, and normally comes with at least a short honeymoon period of results, but not as far as Leeds are concerned. We may have beaten Southampton, but they were truly awful on the day.

I'm not expecting Gracia to wave a magic wand, yet I fail to see any improvement in play, begging the question whether Messrs Orta and Radrizzani were right to get rid of Marsch when they did? In hindsight, they should have done it earlier, meaning Gracia's hands are somewhat tied.

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How long before the ER faithful turn on the players

We've seen the ER faithful turn on Marsch, we've seen them turn on the board, yet they rarely turn on the players. With 22 points from 25 games, Leeds find themselves in a worse predicament then they did at this point last season, whilst teams all around them continue (on occasion) to cause upsets. Are the players beyond belligerence? Maybe a kick up the ass would do them good?

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Morning all. No improvement to be seen yet. It will take time if it happens at all. Problem is we're running out of time. Our best bet for survival is that with so many other awful teams around us, it could take a record low number of points to survive, or 31 or 32. Can't see us getting more than that without radical improvement in the attacking and finishing and just hope for the best. It's still the same old problem, we've nobody with the confidence to have a go. They all want to pass the ball to someone else and give them the responsibility. Confidence is clearly shot and its no wonder

 

Morning. Same ****, different match. The players have to be in the blame for this. On paper its a good squad as you mention, but in reality they are utter ****e. Im sure its a confidence thing, but they need to step up and actually play football like professionals, and not sunday league ****e at best.

The next few matches are going to be hard, so they need to show up, and we need Rodrigo back asap. At least he can score goals. Seems that teams have sussed out Gnonto and mark him to ****.

I honestly dont think we will turn this around, and I dont think that will be the managers fault. I want to be proved wrong mind, as obviously dont want to see them relegated.

Oh, and why the hell cant we just shoot instead of trying to walk the ball into the back of the net? That gets my blood boiling..

On a different note, wasnt it great to see Scum spanked 7-0 yesterday?

 

It was just wish it was by someone else, winds me up no end seeing that Colgate grinning clot Klopp, smirking at the cameras.

 

I’m obviously at desperation point because I’m thinking why not throw Perkins or Joseph in, see if they sink or swim? They can’t be any worse with their finishing and other clubs will know little about them? I don’t think clubs have worked out Gnonto, it’s just that refs seem to let the opposition kick the **** out of him!

 

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every silver lining has a cloud

but just to make you feel more 'glass half full about it'.... with the possible exception of city, if you had to pick a team they'd least like to get tonked by... it's the scousers.

 

We needed a striker at the start of the season. Gelhardt was never the answer and a creative mid. So we sign McKennie who is not creative and can't shoot. Everton are playing without a striker so have mainly relied on set pieces last few games. I totally believe orta and rads know nothing about a balanced squad.

 

Watching Nunez, Salah and Gakpo yesterday you see what we are missing. A front 3 who score goals but without Rodrigo we dont have a 9 because Bamfird has been pants and injured still. We pay a fortune for Georginio who has yet to score and get a grip. We have Sinisterra who could be there scoring but out injured all season, we have Gnonto who has contributed but not enough, we have Aaronson who has contributed nothing, Harrison the same, Summerville started well but been pants in front of goal. Javi needs to sort out his options for a front 2 or 3 and drill them to death otherwise our season is dead

 

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Rutter: Where am I

Wober: Oi Fofana, do you mind not choking Weston!

McKennie: ecccccccchh...

 

I said it at the end of Bielsa.

I said it in defence of Marsch.

I'm still saying it under Gracia.

The players do not do the basics well enough. They make simple mistakes all over the pitch be it passing a ball, not staying with runners, not focusing on shooting on target, not concentrating. We make more basic errors than any other team in this division. How many games is Harrison going to overhit free kicks until he adjusts it accordingly? How many times are we trying to hit the top corner instead of hitting it hard and low on target? How many times do we let players (like Fofana) run off markers to get a free header (we did it twice on saturday)? How many times are Gnonto/Summerville going to beat opponents and then not put a cross in?

It's players that let the club down. Not Bielsa, Marsch or Gracia. The players have confidence issues and aren't mentally strong enough to overcome them. We are a team full of habitual losers.

We need a few lucky bounces to go our way, maybe a couple of dodgy decisions, anything which turns the players confidence issues around. Newcastle were in the same boat around this time last year. Their turnaround was at ER when they were second best all afternoon before our keeper let a **** free kick squirm underneath him (yet more evidence of our continuing panic under pressure) and they used that to go on a run.

 

Spot on emu.

I’d only counter to some degree that part of a manager’s job is to instil confidence. You could see that was a big part of what marsch was trying to do… but either it didn’t work Or the alternative is that maybe what separates the good player from PL standard is consistency. Lesser players make more mistakes.

Probably a bit of both confidence and ability with our lot.

 

Correct......basics.....and basically we can't do them,the table doesn't lie so basically we have been **** and learnt precisely nowt from last season's near miss.... It's a poor show and lessons haven't been heeded

 

Just need to change the words to PLEASE SHOOT

 

For what it's worth we have better attacking players and strikers than every other club fighting against relegation. In fact you have to go right up to Crystal Palace in the table before it's even debatable and even they struggle to score with only 21 goals scored so far this season.

Tighten up at the back as Gracia is doing and hopefully we'll be fine.

 

Harrison has contributed nothing? And yet he has been involved in 10 goals this season (2g, 8a). Only Rodrigo had managed better at 14 (12g, 2a). No-one else comes close. Believe it or not, 3rd in line is BamBam! with 7 involvements (3g, 4a). Not much else to look at beyond that. Sadly.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/teams/leeds-united/top-scorers/assists

Sometimes you've got to appreciate what you've got, rather than what you think you've got.

 

... shame a lot of those goal involements were in the cups, not the league WJ, jack is 1 goal, 5 assists in the league, and paddy is 1 goal and 2 assists in the league ...and one of those was the miscontrol/pass to summerville at liverpool

 

think the spammers would be in that debate and leicester... its hard to say whether our attacking line up has better players. We hype up the young lads, but other clubs fans think the same about their youngsters. Our main strikers spend more time on the treatment table. We create more than most down the bottom... despite the terrible manager we had... so do we laud our attacking players for creating chances or lambast them for then missing them?

 

That’s our Easter trip all booked. Arriving Leeds 7.30pm and heading home on Sunday. 33 of us on this one. Novelty never wears off the trips

 

As far as I remember, the rest of the team were available for the cup games too & they had the opportunity to create / score just like Harrison - only they didn't. Why are you attempting to belittle his contribution? He took his chances, the others in the team didn't. Doesn't matter who the opposition were - they all had an equal chance to shine & only Rodrigo surpassed him.