Maybe marginally better but I didn’t see miles better. That ridiculous space being left at times in our right back position nearly cost us again last night.
Meslier - 6. Didn't have much to do. Goal wasn't his fault. Made a good save on to the post but nearly got beat on his near post again. Defence would be appreciative if he came for the odd cross. Ship him out. Ayling - 7. Rolled back the years with an impressive performance. Beaten a couple of times defensively but overall more than held his own down that flank. Rodon - 7. Decent debut. He wasn't really noticeable at all which is good because it meant he made no glaring errors which is a pleasant change for a Leeds defender. Struijk - 6. Good on the ball. His positioning defensively worries me still but wasn't punished by West Brom. Decent performance on the whole. Byram - 6. His height is an asset at the back. Sloppy in possession at times. A good squad player and much better than Hjelde or the elusive Junior Firpo (who is **** Blono). Buy a ****ing left back. Ampadu - 7. Kept things ticking over. A little quieter than usual but did his job efficiently enough. Caught out a couple of times the wrong side of his man. Gray - 6. Good ability to read the game and pinch balls that set us on our way. A little sloppy at times but overall another confident evening. Took a knock and that stifled him a bit as teams figure out they need to kick him off the park. We can't keep flogging him like this, he'll get hurt soon. Shackleton - 8. Like a busy little wasp all over the place. Great engine, great tenacity and plays the simple pass. Nearly scored. His best game for Leeds? James - 9. Our go to player. Another one who ran his blood to water. We can talk about his miss when he was offside or we can talk about their keeper making two world class saves to deny him and his excellent cross for Ayling to equalise. Been a handful all season. Rutter - 5. Didn't get any real service the first hour. Couple of nice touches but overall never really got in to the game. Nearly got the winner from distance but sliced it just wide. If he gets one he might go on and get a few. Gelhardt - 5. Can't fault his effort. Had a nice snap shot on target but ultimately he was the playmaker and he didn't influence the game too often. A few games with the 21's to get his confidence levels back up might not go a miss. Subs. Greenwood - 6. Not much in open play but a couple of decent set pieces.
Overall it was a pretty dominant performance. We just concede everytime the ball goes on target. It's not always Meslier fault but we need a more dominant keeper imo. He's way too passive and it's causing us problems. We still don't get much luck with decisions or deflections and last night their goalkeeper was man of the match again. It happened multiple times last season. Buy a ****ing left back. Buy a striker. Buy a creative player. Buy a midfielder who can play next to Ampadu and take some strain off Archie.
Overall we were way better than Cardiff, Shrewsbury and West Brom. (I didn't see the Brum game). The issue is, and has been for some time, that everytime the ball heads toward our goal it tends to go in. We don't concede many shots either. It leads me to believe that we need a better keeper, a dominant one. It's pretty simple. We need to be more clinical up front and tighter at the back.
Reading Meslier reacted with a gesture to the South last night after getting more than a fair share of abuse. Not good to abuse players
Just to point out in 3 of those games, Darlow was in goal for one, Birmingham scored with a penalty, and WBA scored from a deflective shot with the illegal use of the hand. In the Cardiff game, I felt the goals came from more outfield defensive errors, but appreciate that is subject to individual opinion. So I'm not sure how having a more dominant keeper in 3 of the 4 competitive games we have played this season would have helped stopping the actual goals that were scored.
Shouldn't give abuse to players but when he has openly said that he wanted to go and play for Chelsea after the season he ****ing had then I think it's fair play if someone calls him a **** and tells him he's not good enough. I wouldn't do it myself but if it's hurting his feelings then so ****ing what. Hundreds of thousands of Leeds fans were hurt after him being the ****test keeper in the PL 2 seasons running. If he doesn't like deserved criticism... please log in to view this image
I don't think anybody would or could have got more out of the group of players available. Even Shack was on form last night.
Morning mate. Yeah, I'm not really picking on the goals. I've said Meslier can't be blamed for that last night. It's more in general. We still seem a bit panicky at times, particularly on crosses where we seem to give up alot of chances or half chances. I think a keeper that comes for more crosses might inspire a bit more confidence and calmness around the whole unit. Even a more vocal goalkeeper would help. Meslier just seems a bit placid, even surprised that the ball comes towards him. The whole defensive unit needs changing imo after the last two years. Not good enough. We're still conceding over a goal a game and we've not played any top championship teams yet. It's no coincidence that Meslier, Cooper, Struijk, Ayling are still mainstays of this unit and we still concede goals at an alarming rate.
In this division, teams, especially those not expecting to be in the promotion mix, are going to come and park the bus… and hope to nick something on the break or from a set piece. So even with our weakened squad, strikes me we would expect to ‘outplay’ them but not necessarily find them easy to beat them.
All valid points and you may well be right. The reason I mention the games and goals this season, is that other than the Cardiff game, a more dominant keeper probably wouldn't have helped stop those goals. Not sure it would have helped against Cardiff either, but can concede it possibly might. I'll admit I like Meslier, I don't think he is as bad as it's been made out. Last year was poor and it seemed like he had lost all confidence in himself and the defence in front of him and should have beed dropped sooner than he was. Playing behind the back 4 that we have had for the last few years can't be easy. The style of football we played under Bielsa protected the defence to some extent, until it all went pear shaped. BPF started ok then errors creeped into his game. Kiko looked ok bringing his experience to the defence, but again errors creeped in. Meslier, with just 28 french second division games and 10 championship games to his name, makes his debut in the EPL as a 20 year old and has a great season, that people on here are saying he must be worth £40m+. Then errors creep in. Are we just bad at buying keepers. Did our initial style of play hide the deficiencies in those keepers. Is playing behind our back 4 for a lengthy period so intensive, that our keepers burn out. Or do our keepers get it into their head that with so many defensive errors, then need to be ready to bale them out, that when it comes to the simple stuff, they have lost focus. I've written this season off (although let's be honest I write every season off before it begins), but given that Farke is making changes to the defence, then I'd like to see how he performs behind hopefully a more stable defence, and then be proved horribly wrong
That's why I advocate a strategy of ****ing the lot of them off and starting from scratch. New keeper. New back 4.
I can't argue with that. Stats don't support my argument either, but I'd still like to see how he would do behind a more stable defence with ourselves, as opposed to with another club. Obviously if he wants to leave, then he can **** off
Am off to Eastbourne Borough today. WDL. If they start doing a Leeds then may have to reconsider going there in future.
So Mike Dean said that the goal stod because no Leeds players was hardly complaining. Maybe they should ****ing start then
The guys an idiot. If we had complained, there would have been more yellow cards and knowing our luck, a red card too
