Here are your Leeds United morning headlines for Friday, November 13th.
Andy Townsend questions Bielsa patience
Andy Townsend has questioned how long Leeds fans will have patience with Marcelo Bielsa and his high-risk style of play.
Bielsa’s team took the Premier League storm initially, winning three of their first six games and only narrowly losing to champions Liverpool on the opening day. However, since then, results have taken a turn for the worse, with consecutive 4-1 defeats to Leicester City and Crystal Palace in the last week, and Townsend believes that questions will be asked of the system if the struggles persist.
“I worry a little bit for them if they're just going to blindly continue with this 'we can win games 4-3 if we need to'.” he said on talkSPORT . “It's why Guardiola and Pochettino love him and I think any football fan out there would generally relish and welcome a Bielsa-type team playing Premier League football. We do.
“I just wonder how much the Leeds fans will honestly, hand on heart, say this is the right way to go if the Premier League status became in any way, shape or form, debatable over the way they play and approach. Would he change, could he change, should he change?”
Bielsa knows Nicolas Pépé well
When Leeds return to action following the international break, they host Arsenal at Elland Rd. Fortunately for the Whites, Bielsa knows one of the more dangerous threats extremely well.
As Joe Donnuhue writes for Leeds Live , Bielsa worked extensively with Nicolas Pépé at Lille before he came to Leeds in 2018.
Bielsa’s time at Lille was brief and bombastic. He was ultimately suspended after just 13 games following some drastic decisions from the Argentinian. One of those was to tell senior players from the first team that they could leave, signing unproven youngsters to replace them, one of which was Pépé from Angers SCO.
Pépé played 11 times under Bielsa , scoring three goals. Following Bielsa’s departure, he went on to score 13 goals as Lille staved off relegation, before then notching north of 20 in the 2018/19 season, earning his £72 million move to Arsenal.
While Pépé has not flourished for the Gunners as he did at Lille, Bielsa will know better than most how to handle the Ivorian next weekend.
You can read Donnuhue’s full analysis here .
Dallas says Northern Ireland defeat “hard to put into words”
Stuart Dallas and Northern Ireland narrowly missed out of next summer’s European Championships, losing 2-1 to Slovakia in extra-time in the Euros play-off on Thursday night.
Afterwards, Dallas says the agonising defeat is “hard to put into words”.
“Not really, no,” he said when asked if he can sum up his disappointment by BBC Sport . “It’s hard to put into words now, so soon after the game. It’s a huge disappointment for us. The boys are devastated in there. We left everything on the pitch.
“We knew what game is what going to be. We’re devastated. We thought we could win the game. We got ourselves back into it. Big Kai has hit the post at the end, just after we’ve equalised. It’s a game of fine margins.
“The lads gave everything, left everything out there. That’s all you can ask for. That’s one thing about this group. We give everything, but unfortunately tonight, it just wasn’t enough.”
