Leeds United Team Talk/Gossip/Rumours 2020/2021

GoldFour4

We need a spark for the second half. Maybe Pablo in for Roberts.

whiterebel

Was there an incident previously El-Ghazi? I wish the commentator would mention it.......

Seathrun66

whiterebel wrote: »

Was there an incident previously El-Ghazi? I wish the commentator would mention it.......

Should have been booked for studs on Dallas' calf. A yellow would lhave left him very vulnerable to Raphinha attacks.

Hijpo

Did costa swap with raphinha near the end there or did Costa somehow find himself on the left?

Dallas picking up El Ghazi on that free there, is that wise?

event

Roberts and Costa off
Pablo and Harrison on please

event

I assume Dallas to midfield now.

The danger with Raph being so good is we are constantly giving him the ball. Need another outlet, we are becoming predictable

purple hands

Not creating anything, Villa working very hard tbf

Hijpo

At this stage, if we get half a chance we need to take it

whiterebel

Very lethargic looking today.

GoldFour4

Ah just get Roberts off. Played okay in the last game but has done nothing today

purple hands

malistheman wrote: »

Ah just get Roberts off. Played okay in the last game but has done nothing today

He's tiring and getting worse too

Ceist_Beag

Don't know how Roberts is still on the pitch, he's a liability. Get Pablo on please

GoldFour4

This is the most frustrating performance in a while. Villa have defended well but we haven’t been creating much either.

Pablo for last 15 would be nice.

event

Villa are very good defensively tbf, think they are in top 5 best defences in the league

10000maniacs

Not a single attempt for Leeds in 25 minutes. Poor.

Seathrun66

event wrote: »

Villa are very good defensively tbf, think they are in top 5 best defences in the league

Clear to see. But we've not tested them for quite a while and lots of sloppy passing.

Mushy

Haven't deserved anything.

Targett on a yellow and and studs into Raphinha should be a second yellow

Hijpo

Mushy wrote: »

Haven't deserved anything.

Targett on a yellow and and studs into Raphinha should be a second yellow

Villa full backs constantly falling on the ground when under pressure. Really really soft free kicks breaking our press.

whiterebel

All the Vill appealers are at it. All the screaming and crying seems to be from their players. Doesn't hide the fact that we are rubbish today.

10000maniacs

When we are a goal down, we can't even do the five yard passes.

whiterebel

Meslier goes up for the corner???

Ceist_Beag

Very frustrating game, didn't really deserve anything with that performance. The only positive was another 90 minutes for Llorente and he looked good again tonight.

~Rebel~

whiterebel wrote: »

Meslier goes up for the corner???

I quite liked when he went and stood right on Martinez, not something you usually see from a keeper going forward, and a really good idea - and then before it was taken he went back out into the bunch again, and the ball dropped straight into Martinez' hands. Could've been really interesting had he stayed tight to the keeper and made things awkward for Martinez, given his height.

Zaph

That was a really poor performance, we never looked like getting anything from the game. You can blame the pitch as much as you like for stopping us playing our normal game, but the team was lethargic and never looked like troubling the Villa defence.

10000maniacs

It's as if Bielsa didn't do his homework on Martinez, El Ghazi and Targett.
Every cross into the box ended up in Martinez's hands.
He should never play Roberts again in that position. Too weak on the ball.

NuckChorris1

We were crap but I’m still happy. We’re gonna be ok and these games will show Bielsa/Orta what needs sorting. Would like to see a few more younger lads given a shot (Geldhart/Greenwood/Drameh/Summerville) just in case they turn out to be the next Rooney or Fabregas and are ready now. No harm and the regular lads have earned the break. I know this is dreaming as Bielsa struggles to rest anyone even for the cup, but would be nice.

event

West ham and Chelsea next. Cant see any points there, West ham are flying and Chelsea are great under Tuchel

But Fulham and Sheffield United after that, should be 6

Then its Man City, Liverpool, Man U. Maybe 1 point there.

whiterebel

It struck me today that everything time we play Struijk at DM, we’re basically playing with 10 men, worse again today with Costa and Roberts. He looks totally lost, and it can’t help his confidence to be the one to suffer all the time. No plan B, same faces coming on to do the same things, we have nobody to shake it up. Worry for me is that Raphinha looked p!ssed off today. He doesn’t seem to appreciate us losing. I fear we may need to be a lot more consistent, and stop shipping so many goals, to keep him. I’ve said it before, but I actually think he’d be worth putting him up front either alone or with Bamford, just to change it up and give defenders a different set of problems.

The Golden Miller

Same problem all season, get a good win and can't build on it. Don't have a clinical enough striker to get the goals consistently versus what we create. Can put the blame here and there on individual games, but that's what it boils down to. If you play a ball through the eye of a needle game, you need a clinical striker

Which is frustrating, because of we're one of the best teams in the league, yet are let down by not scoring enough. So you expect to outplay teams and win nearly every game, so is disappointing when it doesn't happen, after always having so much hope beforehand.

Will always be comfortable position wise playing as we do, as the goals will come in certain games. Just hard to go to the next level without the ability to break teams consistently.

Hard to criticise Bamford though, as any time he does score, it's beautiful, and always gives everything. Would be better off deeper

Mushy

Bamford was nullified very well last night, can't blame him at all. There's many positions in the squad where improved players are needed, no point banging on about one which isn't the most urgent!

is_that_so

Mushy wrote: »

Bamford was nullified very well last night, can't blame him at all. There's many positions in the squad where improved players are needed, no point banging on about one which isn't the most urgent!

This is a team that will change a good bit in the summer and you can almost name those likely to go. It will be interesting once the mathematics say relegation is impossible to see what will happen. Will some of the younger talents get a run out in the remaining games?

Eggs For Dinner

Mushy wrote: »

Bamford was nullified very well last night, can't blame him at all. There's many positions in the squad where improved players are needed, no point banging on about one which isn't the most urgent!

Esentially, a team made up primarily of Championship players need to be playing to the max of their capabilities for Bielsa's system to work. Yesterday was not one of those days

10000maniacs

Fulham did us a favour today.
0:0 against Palace.

Mushy

is_that_so wrote: »

This is a team that will change a good bit in the summer and you can almost name those likely to go. It will be interesting once the mathematics say relegation is impossible to see what will happen. Will some of the younger talents get a run out in the remaining games?

Oh definitely. Just don't see striker being that position this year after the season Bamford has had

Mushy

Eggs For Dinner wrote: »

Esentially, a team made up primarily of Championship players need to be playing to the max of their capabilities for Bielsa's system to work. Yesterday was not one of those days

Couldn't agree more, but singling out Bamford is just wrong

whiterebel

I meant to say after we played Southampton, that I liked Che Adams’ play and effort, and was sorry we didn’t get him. Probably a bit to similar to Bamford, though.

Seathrun66

event wrote: »

West ham and Chelsea next. Cant see any points there, West ham are flying and Chelsea are great under Tuchel

But Fulham and Sheffield United after that, should be 6

Then its Man City, Liverpool, Man U. Maybe 1 point there.

Seven points from the next seven? Please no. I'm hoping for 12-14. We're playing more favoured teams who won't park the bus and we've nothing to lose. Struijk is improving, Llorente is back and hopefully the others are on the way. We may have our entire first eleven sometime next month.

We'll get a couple of bad beatings for sure but one or more of the fancied teams above will get a surprise.

Zaph

Seathrun66 wrote: »

Seven points from the next seven? Please no. I'm hoping for 12-14. We're playing more favoured teams who won't park the bus and we've nothing to lose. Struijk is improving, Llorente is back and hopefully the others are on the way. We may have our entire first eleven sometime next month.

We'll get a couple of bad beatings for sure but one or more of the fancied teams above will get a surprise.

I think event's assessment is a lot more realistic tbh. I'd like to think we're more than capable of beating Fulham and Sheffield Utd. But a point from Man City, Liverpool and Man Utd is possibly even being generous, and if we got lucky against either West Ham or Chelsea there might be another point there, but zero from those five games is not inconceivable. I think 12-14 is definitely beyond us at this stage of our progress, but I can't fault your optimism.

Seathrun66

Zaph wrote: »

I think event's assessment is a lot more realistic tbh. I'd like to think we're more than capable of beating Fulham and Sheffield Utd. But a point from Man City, Liverpool and Man Utd is possibly even being generous, and if we got lucky against either West Ham or Chelsea there might be another point there, but zero from those five games is not inconceivable. I think 12-14 is definitely beyond us at this stage of our progress, but I can't fault your optimism. :)

Thanks man, and I may be way off on my prediction but we've averaged 1.35 points a game against much the same opposition we're soon to play. That'd give us 9.5 points from the seven upcoming games but I expect more. It's an erratic year where form is hard to predict and many of our opposition are involved in European & cup football. We've got big players returning (surely the worst of our injury bad luck is over) and the pressure is off in terms of survival.

I predict we'll have 48 points at the end of April. Event says 42.

Any other takers for this Pool. Winner gets bought pints at Elland Road in early 2022.

Eggs For Dinner

Seathrun66 wrote: »

I predict we'll have 48 points at the end of April. Event says 42.

Any other takers for this Pool. Winner gets bought pints at Elland Road in early 2022.

I predict 28 points, net of a 15 point deduction for repeatedly letting spectators in to the ground on match day via an iPad, in breach of Covid restrictions yet to be made up by the FA.

is_that_so

Rumour that Alioski has asked his agent to start looking for another club. He's been a good servant but just not quite up to the standard and he would be on my list of players to depart this summer.

event

whiterebel wrote: »

I meant to say after we played Southampton, that I liked Che Adams’ play and effort, and was sorry we didn’t get him. Probably a bit to similar to Bamford, though.

He's young but he had one good season with Birmingham a few years ago. Not for me. When we do go to replace Bamford, which wont be for a few years yet hopefully, I want us to go for established players but we'll see. Id rather one of our kids get games than the likes of Adams.

Jimmy Two Times

Disappointing in that we just weren't allowed to play. Have to give Smith some credit as he realised that if we tried to play us at football we'd have too much so went down the Wolves route instead. Funny how we were all delighted that Grealish wasn't playing, maybe if he had played,they would have adopted a different approach as it would have meant that one of El Ghazi,Ramsey or that Marvellous fella wouldn't have played and we might have had more space.

Just on Roberts, he definitely has something about him but has no composure in a tight space when the pressure comes on. Can't really fault him for the Martinez save but when he skied that other one over over the bar, Raphinha was on his left and a simple ball plays him in. Trying too hard maybe as he knows he's under pressure.

Square Ball boys made a valid point on the Phil Hay podcast by saying that when KP was Roberts age he was being slated and looked to have no future. Feel for Roberts as it's much harder to learn in the Premier League.

Struijk seems to slow everything down,passes backwards or sideways all the time,always the safe ball even when he gets up the pitch.

Haven't lost three in a row at any stage this season so hopefully we can pick up something against West Ham 'cos Chelsea won't be easy.

10000maniacs

Does anybody have any hope for the next two games against West Ham and Chelsea?

Jimmy Two Times

Smattering of optimism for West Ham here. We were undone by two set pieces last time we played them and did OK otherwise. Think we look a little better defensively recently and I've liked the look of Llorente,both defensively and with the ball.

Lot will depend on Kalvin being fit and how we set up.

Not trying to second guess Bielsa here but I'd have removed Struijk earlier than we did on Saturday as Villa were set up to stop us playing so the need for a purely defensive player there probably wasn't necessary. Might be something we could look at when playing the likes of Wolves,Villa,Burnley etc. Maybe use a more offensive player ( Dallas ) in that position if Kalvin not available.

Not so hopeful for Chelsea as they are strong in all departments with options in every position.

is_that_so

Kalvin is back training this week but not clear yet if he'll be in contention for next week.

Hijpo

Jimmy Two Times wrote: »

Smattering of optimism for West Ham here. We were undone by two set pieces last time we played them and did OK otherwise. Think we look a little better defensively recently and I've liked the look of Llorente,both defensively and with the ball.

Lot will depend on Kalvin being fit and how we set up.

Not trying to second guess Bielsa here but I'd have removed Struijk earlier than we did on Saturday as Villa were set up to stop us playing so the need for a purely defensive player there probably wasn't necessary. Might be something we could look at when playing the likes of Wolves,Villa,Burnley etc. Maybe use a more offensive player ( Dallas ) in that position if Kalvin not available.

Not so hopeful for Chelsea as they are strong in all departments with options in every position.

Didnt realise Villa are as good as 2nd for most clean sheets in the league.

NuckChorris1

Same message from me. If Kalvin starts then I think we have a chance against anyone. West Ham game is in London though so even with Kalvin we're jinxed!

event

10000maniacs wrote: »

Does anybody have any hope for the next two games against West Ham and Chelsea?

I watched WH recently and was impressed tbh. Their two in the middle play very well together and they are just no nonsense at the back as well

For chelsea, no chance. They have one of the best squads in the league and a good manager now. With that squad they should be up in the top 2/3 to be honest

Seathrun66

10000maniacs wrote: »

Does anybody have any hope for the next two games against West Ham and Chelsea?

Yes, they were very lucky to win the first game and though they're doing very well they're eminently beatable. We'll surely have players back also, and though they may not be in the first team the bench should be far more impressive.
Others may correct me but wasn't Koch supposed to start training this week. Kalvin and Jamie Shackleton must also be close to recovery though I've no idea about Rodrigo or Poveda.

And Chelsea is a different matter. The team that's most overwhelmed us this season I thought. A draw would be good.