Good afternoon Welcome to Thorp Arch and Marcelo Bielsa’s latest press conference. The head coach is expected to start speaking from 1pm. He's here... Right, lets see that what the Leeds boss has to say... Yorkshire derby - do you feel you have to win? We have to win all games. The last result doesn’t give more importance to the obligation to win. Has spygate become a distraction? Are you looking for a quick resolution, one way or the other? What’s happening is the consequence of my behaviour and I have to take the repercussions We are already focusing on football. It’s not about what I would like. I am not in the condition to give a point of view on this. On Jack Clarke - important he stays at Leeds for his own development? The important thing is the opinion of the club and of course the opinion of the player. On Emiliano Sala. Does he know him from Argentina? I played against him. What happened to him is very painful. Very, very painful. How likely are you to play Casilla at Rotherham? Casilla will start. Phillips will play in place of Jansson. Has Clarke being distracted by the speculation? We haven’t talked about this subject. I didn’t talk about it with him. Is he very focused on his work? We have many young players that arrive at the high level. The players who start the high competition at the start, we don’t have many players who do that. And even less players who stay as high players. And the step he is making shows he belongs in the first division and at the highest level. We will have conformation of this with time. Conversations on transfers with Orta? When there is someone to talk about, yes. Why are you playing Casilla? And how has BPF done for you so far? I use the same reason to substitute Farrell I used when I thought about putting Blackman in. Regarding the performance of Farrell, we have two ways of looking at it. He is a goalkeeper with skills. He has the resources to become a starter in an ambitious team. He needs to correct some mistakes. Sometimes when you make mistakes you lose a little bit of confidence. And at the same time the mistakes make you increase your work to correct them. When you make a mistake you suffer pressure. And we need to learn how to live with the pressure. It’s a long process, with many steps and it’s a difficult path, especially when you’re a young player and it’s even more difficult when a team is at the top or bottom of the table. So I thought it was the right time to put Casilla in as a starter but I don’t think that this will stop the improvement of Farrell. The skills that Farrell has, we haven’t seen them so far in the games. But as we see him every day in training, we know his sills and what he is capable of. I think he will play again as a starter in the future. And we have to contribute to take advantage of the time when there are less demanding goals. And we take advantage of this time to allow him to correct what he needs to correct. I think he is a very good asset to Leeds because he has been formed in the club, he is very young, he will play as a professional player for 15 years at least and if he uses the time positive, either playing or not, because when you play what you see is the limits you have, the mistakes you make. And when you make mistakes that have consequences this increases the speed of improvement. And when you have time without pressure it’s the best time to regain confidence and develop the skills you have. Surprised Casilla was willing to come to Leeds? I think that the fans of Leeds United should be proud to have Casilla as a goalkeeper. Because it’s not frequent that you can get a player from Real Madrid. It’s not often a player of this level chooses to play in the Championship. The players always are careful when they have to take decisions and they receive a lot of advice. Casilla comes to Leeds because he thinks he is not making a mistake. He thought a lot about the decision. I think that English football and Leeds United should be proud he came here. What is the focus on training this week? Finishing chances? We played the worst game so far at Stoke. Just after playing the best game of the Championship and it’s very difficult for us to understand our last performance. We played against an opponent that made it easy for us to win the game. And if we had to take a game where it is easy to do what we do the best - attack - it was the game against Stoke City. During all the game we had two players who were always free. Alioski and Ayling. We only had to watch the game to reach this conclusion. The freedom of which these two players received the ball allowed us to take the ball into their box and usually when we have freedom in this zone we are usually in good conditions to do what we do the best, which is to see the switch of tempo, the association play, make combined movements and as a consequence play deep but we couldn’t do any of this. When I say it was a game that we could win we just have to have a look at what were the situations, the chances of the opponent to score and how they got these chances to score. Even when they played with 11 vs 10 the opponent was not an obstacle for us, We were our man obstacle. On injuries Dallas is available. Same for Douglas. They lack tempo of course and need to find the competition pace. Berardi was in the same situation as Dallas and Douglas. He played 45 minutes with the U23s and it was hard for him to assimilate the game. Even if he didn’t get injured again, but we know he will need more time to reach his best level. Dallas and Douglas will play with the U23s next Monday so they will be able to complete for the first team. Bamford started to train normally today. He will increase the tempo next week and in about 10 days he will play an U23 game and he will be available for the first team. Bamford has been absent a long time, same as Izzy Brown. He didn’t play for a year and he will need several games in order to be the player he was before he got injured. This is usually the case for a player who misses a year. He needs between six and eight games to reach his highest level. He will not be on the bench on Saturday. On Casilla's U23s performance this week You can’t make an opinion on this kind of game. It’s a game to get your sport fitness. If I had to make an opinion I would say positive things, but it’s not important. How has he trained? You make an opinion regarding goalkeepers in games. If I make an opinion from training or with the U23s, it will be the opinion from next Saturday. Tough decision not to put Kalvin back in midfield? Adam Forshaw plays very well as a number 4. He is one of the best players of the team. As a matter of fact against Stoke he was the best player. Phillips has adapted very well to the position of centre-back. Of course this doesn’t mean Phillips won’t play as a 4 again or Forshaw as an 8 because these are their positions. What are you expecting from Rotherham? They are different styles. They usually play long balls. They use prolongations of the ball and 50/50 balls, they try to get the second balls. They use long throws, rely on set pieces. And we have different styles. Ours is not better or worse than theirs. They will try to play using their style and we will try to use ours. I think they know what they have neutralise in our game to weaken us. And we know what we have to be careful about to prevent the opponent from growing inside the game. That's all from Bielsa
Is it because he can understand English a little and so the translation gives him a little more time to formulate the correct answer or should he really be a diplomat?
Yep, cheers jammy, love reading Bielsa’s press conferences. And my very last word on spy gate. Frank and his pundit mates bleated all week about the “unfair advantage” we’d get from seeing their line up a day before the game. Bielsa names his team every match at the presser and we’re top. And I’m not sure what set pieces we’ll pick up on (according to Alvin Martin) as I guess it’s “lump it into the box to our big bloke”
Nice to see Bielsa agreeing with most of what I've been saying about BPF, he'll go far Bielsa will. I think with the rest Bielsa was being kind to BPF, in the form of constructive criticism. My opinion of BPF is, he lacks focus and concentration, and has to learn to make instant decisions, and follow through with them straight away; no time to double think about things. Going to be interesting how Cassila reacts to a keeper coach who's never played keeper, I don't think he's use to it.
There are a whole host of football managers and coaches who’ve never played football including World Cup winners, European cup and domestic honours, I googled it but far too many to list. I’d be amazed if Cassila found it a problem and at 33 you’d hope there was nothing left to teach and that his experience would rub off on BPF
I don’t have issue with what bielsa said about bpf yesterday. He’s saying he’s great in training but not currently replicating it in matches. He’s young playing big matches in front of big crowds, there’s pressure... most of which he probably puts on himself. I think there may be a case of not always trusting his instincts... for when to come when not to... and I suspect the problem with the long shots is having time to think... and time therefore to think about the repercussions. I don’t Know this, just my gut. Thing is in this Leeds team, you have nothing to do and then get a clear cut chance or a long ball over the top to deal with. You’re not busy... although you do get a bit of 5 aside. There’s a lot of time to think and dwell... maybe too much. Bielsa obviously does rate him... he went into the season happy to have him as starter. I do think bielsa made a mistake by outing him over the Blackman ‘would have been dropped’ comments. They were obviously designed to rattle his cage, but he’s now saying there may be a confidence issue. Well going public like he did was not going help that. Whichever BPF made some mistakes but actually cost us very few points this season, and made plenty of good saves at crucial times.Casilla has the shirt, now, let’s hope he proves to be the step up people were looking for.
Enlighten us with a piece by piece dissection then wakey if you disagree. Or at least one of your pithy ‘The statue’ type comments.
Fair enough Ristac, respect that, however, keeper is a specialist position, people just don't play keeper unless the keeper instinct is there. When I first started playing football at school I was thrilled to bits to picked as centre forward, everyone back then wanted to be the centre forward who scored the goals; plus, I was tallest kid, but teacher put the smallest kid in goal, not quite the smallest, but close to it. We lost our first game 5-0. I didn't like that, I hated it, I knew I could do better, so I asked the teacher if I could go in goal for next match. We started winning games, not every game, but we won quite a few, and I played in goal till I stopped playing in my very late 30's; only cos I loved playing the game. You can teach someone to play striker or on wing, you can teach someone to play midfield or defender, but the keeper is the only specialist position on field. Please don't argue that one Ristac, cos you know what I mean. When you googled it, did you ask the question "managers who never played football" or "managers who never played professional football" ? Cassila is an experienced keeper, and while football stays the same, the game changes, and keepers have to change with it, or get left behind. Let me ask you, and others a question in general, It could be your job, hobby, specialist skill etc, someone not qualified, never entered into your area of expertise comes by and starts telling you how to do the job.................what's going to be your reaction, silent or verbal?
The future will reveal just how far bpf will go.As for bielsas comments when did he say he lacked confidence.i bet harrison looks good in training. New keeper now has to justify the hype of ex real madrid. Bpf has dropped some right clangers this season he is nowhere near a top end champ keeper.
Did you bother reading it fella “Sometimes when you make mistakes you lose a little bit of confidence. And at the same time the mistakes make you increase your work to correct them. When you make a mistake you suffer pressure. And we need to learn how to live with the pressure. It’s a long process, with many steps and it’s a difficult path, especially when you’re a young player and it’s even more difficult whena team is at the top or bottom of the table.” He basically put it all down to pressure and confidence!
I searched “managers who never played football” I had a go in goal myself, I can’t say I enjoyed it. I’m not arguing about anything you’ve said just giving an opinion that I don’t think it will bother Casilla but who knows.
I believe BPF has all the qualities needed to become a top goalie except experience. Hopefully Casilla will pass on his knowledge which will help BPF.
