Good Morning. It's Thursday 24th March, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road Marsch plans new additions at Thorp Arch Now that Jesse Marsch has his feet firmly under the table, he's looking to implement changes at Thorp Arch. Since his arrival just over three weeks ago, the American has bought in Cameron Toshack and Franz Schiemer to assist him in first team affairs, but plans are afoot for a much bigger workforce. Not all of Bielsa's back room staff left the club when the Argentine departed. Head of Analysis at Elland Road Will Alonso pledged his allegiance to Marsch after the two had a chat, and goalkeeping coach Marcos Abad (who had worked with Orta previously at Boro) also showed his desire to stay put. According to Marsch:- “We will add to the staff eventually,” “Right now it’s a little bit of just trying to get the rhythm with everybody we have here and I'm very thankful." “I spoke about Mark Jackson in the first press conference [and] he's been amazing, amazing. Willy [Alonso] and Aaron, our two video analysts, have invested a lot." “Marcos [Abad], the goalkeeper coach, has worked very closely with us. So we're cranking every day. We're probably all doing about two, three more jobs than we should be, but it's also worked, right. I haven't had enough time to even think about how to build things out from now." “Once we get to the FIFA break, we'll be able to take a little bit of a pause and then we play once every week. Then we'll have a little bit more time to really sort everything out more and more for what things need to look like as we continue to move forward, but the way we're managing things has been very effective." “The players are very clear every match and there's been a lot of efficiency. So that's been good, but there's been a lot of work put on all of our shoulders, which in the moment is okay.” please log in to view this image Drameh will want assurances next season, Davis to stay with Cherries During his latest mail bag, Leeds-Live journalist Beren Cross has been discussing the futures of two of the most promising youngsters to have come through the Leeds ranks in recent times. Cody Drameh, a 1m capture from Fulham in the Summer of 2020 has impressed since joining Cardiff on loan in January. It is suggested the 20yo right back was fed up with the lack of first team opportunities at Elland Road, and forced Leeds into granting the temporary transfer. According to Cross, Drameh will want assurances of first team football if he is to stay at Elland Road. Fellow wing back Leif Davis looks to be on his way out of Elland Road. Whilst first team opportunities at the Vitality Stadium have been few and far between, Bournemouth Manager Scott Parker is keen to keep the young left back. "I certainly believe they will take another close look at Drameh in the summer. From what I have read, he is excelling in the Championship with Cardiff City. Bielsa was very open to allowing the right-back to do what he wanted. If he wanted to go, Bielsa did not want to force him to stay. I wonder what approach Marsch and Orta will take in the summer if they do want Drameh to stick around in 22/23. Based on his attitude to this Cardiff move, he is going to want some assurances on how much he will play if he is to stay at Leeds next season." "From what was said at the time, it sounds like Davis will almost certainly be staying at Bournemouth. It read as though the loan was effectively going to be the first year of a permanent deal at the back end of it. Central midfielders are obviously a priority if they do stay up. Another striker would be welcome given Bamford's fitness issues this season, while with Marsch playing two up top that could make it an easier sell for bringing names in. Another left-back would be nice too." please log in to view this image Marsch hasn't spoken to trio regarding their futures....yet In a recent interview, Jesse Marsch admitted that he would love to keep Phillips, Raphinha and Bamford at Elland Road 'as long as possible', but as of yet has not spoken to anyone at the club about their long term plans. The Gaffer professed the importance of 'living in the moment' for the time being, but admitted the plans to have heart-to-hearts with all three regarding their futures at Elland Road. “I haven't spent any time with anyone talking about [the] long-term future, only about living in the moment and what's important for every day,” “Of course, I would love to keep guys like Kalvin and Patrick [Bamford] and Raphinha. I would love to keep those guys here as long as possible. So we'll see. Those conversations will be had.” please log in to view this image
How the Leeds situation proves that Halsey’s attack on Riley is right: PGMO has gone wrong By Tony Attwood (An Arsenal fan) THIS IS A MUST READ Premier League referees struggling because chief Mike Riley and those in charge NOT giving proper coaching or education It was written by Mark Halsey who was on thePremier league’s list of Select Group Referees from its creation in 2001 until his retirement in 2013. In the article, the ex-ref says, “Ever since Riley took over in 2009, the refereeing standards have gone backwards. I don’t blame the referees on the pitch or at Stockley Park, because they aren’t being given the proper education from those in charge. The coaching our officials are receiving is not good enough. “We’ve got personnel in place that have never refereed at the top level trying to coach officials on how to manage Prem games. “The training of VAR needs to be seriously improved as well because we are seeing huge inconsistencies in reviewing incidents.” Later in the piece, he says, “The PGMOL does not know how to manage their dressing room and I know that because I am still in contact with some officials. They don’t have assessors at games monitoring the officials anymore, there is just an evaluation system so they don’t get that face-to-face feedback in the dressing room like we used to… “It comes back to leadership from Riley and his management team because referee standards have declined since Keith Hackett’s exit.” So the argument is that the management of PGMO is simply not very good, referees are not being trained properly, and the correct procedures are not being introduced. It is a viable argument, and indeed it is excellent to see a newspaper taking on the issue of the quality of refereeing in the Premier League, rather than just parroting the old line about the Premier League being the best league in the world and so having the best referees in the world. But there is a problem because there are other issues besides the training of referees which need to be taken into account. Let me try and outline a few of them. 1: Lack of oversight of PGMO As we have so often said, no one oversees PGMO to make sure it is running itself in a fair and reasonable way. Arsenal can get the same referee over and over again – when self-evidently if each club never had any single referee more than twice in a season, even if there were any rotten apples in the refereeing barrel their effect on individual teams would be limited. Very few organisations in Britain have this sort of freedom to do what they want without supervision, but referees can do. The only thing international football can do to express its disapproval of English referees is to refuse to appoint them to big events, as with the last World Cup. 2: Unwillingness of the media in general to consider that there might be anything wrong The piece in the Sun noted above is special because it is so unusual. But unfortunately, it didn’t take us any further forward in terms of having an independent regulator of refereeing in the Premier League. That won’t happen until the whole of Premier League and Championship football stands up to PGMO and says, “someone needs to be monitoring what you do”. 3. The media deliberately ignore the issues that plague football. Uefa’s revelations about the growth of match fixing and its statement that the Association does not have the resources to counter it, was ignored by the English media – although it was not ignored in the rest of Europe. There are of course two possible reasons for this. One is that the editors believe no one is interested in refereeing (which is hard to sustain as an argument when players and fans so regularly argue with refereeing decisions). The other is that the media has agreed formally or informally not to take on refereeing stories. This is not to suggest a conspiracy but rather to reflect the common agreement that there is between much of the media over what is, and what is not, a story. A rich white man’s house in Berkshire is broken into and robbed and his wife is assaulted – story. A poor black family in Greenwich has their house broken into and robbed, and the family assaulted – no story. 4. Examination of the psychological bias issue All decision making is prone to psychological bias. The word goes around that Leeds are a dirty team and need to be shown who’s boss from kickoff by the referee, and so they are penalised at every turn. Liverpool and West Ham are said to be managed by gentlemen who ensure their teams don’t engage in nasty underhand tactics. They get different treatment. But just look at this table, which is derived from the official figures. So although West Ham and Leeds tackle about the same amount before committing a foul, West Ham can deliver just on twice as many tackles as Leeds before getting a yellow. OK, you might say, that is because when Leeds players tackle they are butchers. And Leeds fouls are almost twice as likely to get a yellow as West Ham fouls. Ah well, you say, that proves it. Now I am not a Leeds fan as you surely must know, but I’ve watched Leeds in person twice this season, specifically looking at the fouls, and I sure didn’t see that their tackles were twice as nasty as West Ham’s (who I have also watched). Nor did I find this when I watched them on TV, doing nothing but specifically looking at the tackles and fouls. I cannot say “this is ref bias pure and simple” nor can I say it is “subconscious bias”. But that looks to me like bias is the most likely explanation. If there is another explanation, why doesn’t someone come forth and make it? But because we have no independent regulator of refereeing, nothing is investigated. Maybe I am wrong and Leeds are twice as dirty as West Ham – at least if there was a regulator it could be examined. If you are a regular reader you’ll know I have no axe to grind on behalf of Leeds, and maybe these figures are somehow justified, but we never even have them justified because the media will not recognise that there is an issue. And when the whole of the media – newspapers, radio, TV – all move in one direction by refusing to recognise an issue: I smell a revolting rat. So thank you Mark Halsey for opening this can of worms. But please please please don’t stop there. Let’s go forward and work out what is going on and why. Given that clubs are not being treated equally, it can’t just be a lack of referee education. So please keep going, for if anyone can explain things, it is probably you.
Morning all I'm still in swaledale soaking up the good weather. Of those three i think Raphinha would be the easiest to sell and easy to replace. So if he goes for a big profit then sell.
I stopped reading when I got to this bit. Race is irrelevant in discussing the standard of refereeing. Totally unnecessary analogy.
Morning all First off Baren Cross marked nbody higher than a 5 last week and most were 4s and 3s. The Norwich match he had some players on minus. Gobshyte full of self importance and knows nothing. Example: parker was interviewed a few days ago and asked about Davies. He said that Davies started really well, but went backwards after an injury, finding it hard to get a starting place, but doing well now in training. We will have to wait and see on what we do…… cross reckons Bournemouth will buy him? On what information? I agree with Wakey Raphinha is replaceable and to be fair maybe Summerville can dothat because he can also play narrower and more central. We also have James and Harrison As far as the refs goes just allow the club to fight our corner as Radz and Kinnear are not scared of a fight
So Drameh is playing well with a team from the Championship lying in 17th place and wants a guarantee of first team football. What a knob, I'd ****ing sell the twat to Cardiff.
Agreed Shaks. Maybe he’s hoping his inept performances in a Leeds shirt went unnoticed by Marsch, but I’m hoping our new coach is well aware of what went on before. Drameh seems full of his own self-importance and doesn’t strike me as a team player. He needs to be told there’s no way back for him at Leeds.
IF YOU BELIEVE BAREN CROSS. I read an interview from last week given by the Cardiff Manager and it went something like this: Drameh could win player of the year, the fans love him, hes attacking he can defend very well and creates chances for us. There will be little chance of him being here next season unless Leeds think he is benefitting from being here. We couldnt afford to but him and Cody says he wants to fight for bis place in the Leeds team….. so yet again Cross talks bollox and winding everyone up. Drameh wants to play for Leeds…fact
I've never heard of B. Cross or read anything that he's said. I'm just saying that Drameh is playing Championship football with a team who are 17th. I appreciate that you're a fan of his and like yourself I've watched him play with the u23s a lot and he is very good for the u23s, but with all due respect Doc, the u23s are totally different to playing in the Premier.
With regard to Leeds getting more yellow cards than West Ham, that's an easy one. I watch our players getting booked for simple tackles and they NEVER complain, whereas WH players are in the face of the ref constantly moaning and whinging. Refs are human, they don't want all that ****. Much easier to book a Leeds player who will just run away and make the ref feel like he's the boss. This is the culture that Bielsa instilled in his team, and it's one we need to offload as soon as possible!
Not having a go at you Shaks, its aimed at Cross who just makes shyt up. Leeds Live is half a dozen geeks working in their bedrooms and never been anywhere to interview anyone. His comments about Drameh are bound to wind up fans, but if he had just googled Morison or Cardiff City he could have read stuff that was actually said and at least sound like he knew what he was talking about. I keep an eye on all the players out on loan and read what fans say…. on the 17th place bit Cardiff were in bottom 3 when he went there, he has helped to shore up the defence as well as increasing the attack threat. Cardiff now easily safe
I think there is one is one other contributing factors to the Leeds card stats, that I haven’t seen mentioned. man 2 man marking - getting tight to players means there are a fair few cynical fouls to stop a player getting away, shirt pulls etc. and these are the kind of ‘professional’ fouls that draw cards. I still think we’ve had some shocking decisions against us this season and it hasn’t evened itself out, but there is a cynical edge to bielsaball out of possession.
I'd hope we were 'cynical', though other fans may call it 'doing what is needed to win'. I'd also argue we probably commit a number of those fouls where 1v1 the opposition player is better and turns ours.
We could never go down like shot by a sniper or holding face because Bielsa wouldnt allow it yet we got hammered constantly by refs and VAR. Soft penalties given but not to us……
Pascal Struijk has just said that Raphinha and Summerville are absolutely frightening to face and the scariest at the club. We also know that Hamburg, PSV and Feyenoord are trying to sign him, maybe he is the answer to replacing Raphinha if he goes? He would however need to demonstrate his talent in the first team like Joffy, but so far hes been a bit hit and miss
