Inside Leeds United's pre-season tour with Japan decision, Brazil stress test and Under 21 group — YEP 21/7/26

By Graham Smyth

Leeds United's 65-strong travelling party will fly to America this week to begin a pre-season tour with '10-fold' the logistical requirements of the last two summer training camps.

The initial conversations about the summer 2026 pre-season tour took place back at the start of December. The club's focus was then dominated by the hectic Christmas fixture list and preparing for the January transfer window, but at the same time they were working through hypotheticals on the destination for pre-season. Europe, America and Asia were all in the conversation. In January the offers started coming through to the commercial team at Elland Road.

First team operations manager Matt Robertshaw told the YEP that while the commercial considerations are in the mix, football comes first. He said: "You've got a picture of what the football side preference would be and then you've also got a picture of any potential commercial offers that look good options for the club. Robbie [Evans, MD] and Adam [Underwood, sporting director] and the senior management level, Daniel included, they're great in the sense that it's always a football first approach. We'll obviously explore commercial options, but we need to make sure that anything we do doesn't impact on what we can deliver for the football side. Last year with the physical stats and the [positive] injury record and everything that played a part - you obviously saw in Germany last summer the load the players were under."

By the end of January the club decided that they were heading to the US, having used Ao Tanaka's national team connection to weigh up a trip to Japan and a trio of games against J1 League opposition.

"We explored both," said Robertshaw. "I started doing all the background checks. I spoke with the team manager for Japan [national team] about their facilities and set-up, through the connection with Ao. We worked out that that was probably going to be a bit of a bit of a stretch, and that it didn't end up being the level of opponent that we were wanting."

The US tour that Leeds plumped for was put together by promoters TEG, who put on last summer's Dublin friendly against AC Milan at the sold-out Aviva Stadium and are behind the Manchester United game at Croke Park this summer. The tour was based around Liverpool's concrete involvement and pitched to others, like Leeds.

"Usually the promoter will take one anchor club," said Robertshaw. "So with this it was Liverpool based in Chicago, and then they work from there float it out to teams that they've worked with, teams that they think would be a good fit. Wrexham have a big commercial pull now with their ownership. Sunderland obviously had an amazing season last year. And I feel like the promoter enjoyed working with us last year. I think they just know the size of Leeds and the massive pull that comes with it."

Once the decision was made, Robertshaw and his department had six weeks to properly dig into the plan and map out the logstics, starting with where they wanted to be based. One option was a warm weather training camp in Tampa, from where they would fly out to the other two games. The other was to base themselves at Red Bull's brand new state-of-the-art training facility in New York. It opened in the spring and has been stress tested by a pretty elite footballing organisation.

"Brazil were picked to be based there for the World Cup," Robertshaw told the YEP. "So you know it's going to be state-of-the-art and Brazil will ensure that no stone is left unturned. So we focused on that as our hub and wanted to create a team camp, similar to what the FA did with England being based in Kansas and flying out for the fixtures. We want to make sure the players feel like they have a home away from home, where Daniel and Chris [Domogalla, head of performance] can really get the load into the players, around the fixtures."

Robertshaw and a Leeds delegation paid a visit to the States during the March international break, spending six days in New York, Tampa and Chicago to look at a couple of hotel options in each city and a similar number of training facilities. They visited the Red Bull facility and two in Tampa. Domogalla went too, flying out to the States after speaking at a conference to meet Robertshaw and the team in New York.

"We were able to start tweaking the roadmap we'd drawn out, tweaking it for what would work for the team," he said. "Even the little details - for example we're flying commercial out to the US from Manchester and then charter on the internals out there and flying back on a charter to ensure we don't lost training days. The charter company are based out of Paris, so we had Chris fly on the exact aircraft we're going to come back on from Chicago, to make sure everything is at the level we're wanting."

Once back in Leeds the decision was confirmed and then it became a succession of Zoom and Teams calls to put everything in place for what will be a 65-strong traveling party from the club's football department. Robertshaw believes the commercial offer would have remained on the table even if Leeds had suffered relegation to the Championship, but securing Premier League status for 2026/27 allowed them to plough ahead with Plan A, sign off on charter flights and stick to the initial schedule without the need to factor in an earlier start to next season.

An advance party flew out on Monday, arriving into JFK airport and getting to the hotel to set up the training facility and assist in making it a slick arrival for the players. The early arrivals included a member of the operations and security teams, a performance chef, nutritionist and a physio.

While a lot of the medical and technical equipment Leeds use in pre-season is too unique to be purchased out in the States, the advance team were sent with an extensive shopping list. In Tampa, in 35 degree heat, they will need to be able to prepare ice towels for hydration breaks. In the hotel rooms they will need photo frames, because the club will place a family photo in each player's room. An Amazon order was placed and a trip to Costco is on the agenda before the players' arrival Stateside.

"As soon as the team get to the hotel they're straight in for their first meal and then there's the opportunity to do any sort of mobility work after the flight and physios can get to work on any bits they need to do, so the lads can really hit the ground running on Wednesday when they're straight into a double session. So it's welcome to the US, lads. Seven-hour flight, but geared up, refuelled, had your treatment and you're ready to go. A massive part of it from the football side is how do we fulfil a commercial tour and everything that comes with it, without losing training time or impacting match preparation. That real football-first focus filters down from Daniel, Robbie and Adam."

Robertshaw reckons the logistical workload for this tour is '10-fold' the requirement of the Germany trips in each of the last two summers. The players even twinned in hotel rooms for that first behind-closed-door tour in Germany. Senior players will get their own rooms on this trip, particularly because of the length of time they will spend away from home. Around nine Under-21 players will go out to help bulk out the squad due to the late arrivals of World Cup players and they will share rooms.

The Germany trips were somewhat unique in that regional authorities decided not to permit Leeds fans to attend games. Leeds United's own internal security team was sufficient to handle that situation and the presence of a handful of supporters at the team hotel for one of the friendlies. On this trip Leeds are using the 49ers connection. The Nickel Group provide 'executive protection' for the 49ers and will assist Leeds as they navigate US rules and regulations. Three familiar faces from the Elland Road security team will also be there throughout the tour, with so much more scope for player-fan interaction than in Germany.

"I think it'll be amazing for the players to see, especially the new signings and even the signings from last year who obviously just went to Germany, to see the actual reach of Leeds United in the US," said Robertshaw.

Though Robertshaw himself grew up in the area and is a Leeds fan, he continues to be amazed by the club's global pull. Organising this tour has done it again. "It still always surprises me," he said. "We go to JFK and we're speaking with officials about how we make the immigration arrival slick, can we get our own baggage carousel, etcetera. It turns out the manager of the arrivals hall is a huge Leeds fan and he's like 'no problem guys, I'll look after you.' You just have to smile, the number of people across the world you meet when you're planning these things who are huge Leeds fans."

All and any Leeds fans either making the trip across the pond or travelling from their US homes to see their beloved team in action this summer will be hoping to catch sight of new signings - even better if they join the club midway through the tour. Last summer Lucas Perri and Anton Stach completed their moves to Leeds during the training camp and the club had to be fully prepared for such eventuality. The same is true this summer.

"We're fully prepared, especially with us going away for two weeks and with the World Cup just finishing, that there could be signings during that period. So we're prepared both for medical and signing in the UK, and then direct to the team in New York, Tampa, or Chicago, and we're also fully prepared with medical facilities in the US just through connections at the the two training facilities in New York and Tampa to get those scan slots ready, and do a full medical over there in the US."

Robertshaw's big frustration with last summer's tour was the apparent about-face when it came to the presence of Leeds fans. The German football authorities had offered approvals, only for a hard no to come from the police. This summer he's looking forward to a fuller Leeds United pre-season experience.

"That was definitely in our mind when planning pre-season this year - we had to do something to deliver to our fanbase, for their loyalty throughout," he said.

"So it's been amazing to plan and prep, but we know it's going to be difficult to deliver on. Nothing that can't be done, of course, but lots of moving parts and sleepless nights and late phone calls and switching to Plan B. It'll be great once we're over there."