Bielsa’s Leeds looking like a less fierce version of their true selves - The Athletic 30/8/21


By Phil Hay

Jurgen Klopp’s face was a lasting image, fatigued by his first encounter with Leeds United. Likewise Pep Guardiola, out in the rain at Elland Road and drained by the devilment Marcelo Bielsa was causing. Managers in the Premier League found out last season, driven to the edge and vocal with their admiration.

Sean Dyche was never likely to let his facade crack like that because Dyche is programmed to give less than an inch, armed with a plan which is making his No 10, Ashley Barnes, the anti-Christ in the eyes of other teams. For much of Sunday’s game at Burnley, though, Leeds’ reputation hid from view, lacking the substance that built it so convincingly.

Bielsa’s squad do not intimidate with studs up or big hits but their football at its best has been brutal in its brilliance, fierce enough to make full time a blessing for the clubs who fare worst against it. That football was why Chelsea set a record for distance covered against Leeds last December and why, perhaps, they never flicked so brightly under Frank Lampard again. Bielsa has a knack of making rival coaches adopt the brace position and throw everything at him in return. The alternative approach rarely ends well.

Three games into this season and those levels of intimidation are a little diminished, though Dyche was not dissuaded from thinking that leaving a foot in was the best way as any to redress the 4-0 thrashing Leeds dished out at Turf Moor three months earlier. Full contact was the order of the afternoon and Burnley’s aggression shaped the game in a way which deprived Bielsa’s players of their disciplined swagger. Manchester United on day one was never a gimme for Leeds, and Everton at home was a hard second fixture. Burnley away was the sort of date which guided Bielsa into ninth place last term. In contrast, he entered the final five minutes yesterday 1-0 down and crying out for a chance.

It materialised on 86 minutes and when Patrick Bamford scored it, the goal came from the forward who tends to be waiting with a finish up his sleeve whenever Leeds most need one. In that respect, they are still that team. But the attempt to pin Burnley back came very late on, after a period in which it looked like it would not come at all. Leeds had the ball — they always have the ball — but at the point where Burnley opened the scoring in the 61st minute, Leeds’ possession had resulted in less than 18 per cent of the match being played in Burnley’s final third. Bamford’s finish was a first shot on target and a welcome shot in the arm.

Chance creation and overwhelming pressure had been two of Bielsa’s strengths at Leeds, the individual cornerstones of a highly-defined style. That so many chances went begging in his first two seasons (a constant gripe of one of the game’s perfectionists) only underlined the stress that Leeds were able to inflict on the defence in front of them; wasteful in front of goal but Championship winners nonetheless. Out of possession, Burnley succeeded in blocking off passing lanes through the centre circle and limiting sieges around their box. When precision mattered it was often lacking; Bamford’s heavy touch wasting a quick first-half counter-attack and Raphinha’s shot across goal doing the same in similar circumstances. A very different game if those go in, rather than the game Burnley crafted.

Bamford’s close-range equaliser four minutes from time made sense of two stories from the past fortnight, as if there was any mystery behind them. His new contract at Leeds and the pay rise in it represents the expectation that he will come up with 10 to 20 goals again this season and make sure their league position is comfortable. His England call-up on Thursday, four and a half years on from a torrid loan at Burnley where he and Dyche banged heads badly, was Gareth Southgate giving into the fact that Bamford is sticking around as a striker at this level. As he drove in a shot and set up a late push for a winner, there were shades of the day at Turf Moor in 2011 when Robert Snodgrass rescued Leeds with two goals from very little, the player Simon Grayson knew he could count on to find the net.

In the build-up to Bamford’s finish was a little piece of skill from Raphinha, enough to cause the unbalancing of the opposition, as Bielsa likes to put it. Some of Leeds’ better traits were under the surface — Bamford poaching, Raphinha scheming, Bielsa’s team possessing the stamina to make Burnley sweat briefly in injury-time — but if styles make bouts then Burnley’s devotion to street-fighting made this one for them. “The game was very disputed,” Bielsa said, admitting that Burnley had not allowed Leeds to settle or attack with much ferocity.

There were handicaps beforehand as Mateusz Klich and Junior Firpo tested positive for COVID-19. No problem, Bielsa insisted, because he had players prepared to cover for them but in a 3-3-1-3, Kalvin Phillips bore a heavy load in midfield and Burnley tried hard to outnumber him. Dyche’s side pressed, hassled and dived in when the opportunities arose and if there was any doubt that referees are taking a lighter touch in the Premier League this season, the evidence was all over the pitch. The shift in officiating is still to find the balance between encouraging players not to simulate and encouraging players to steam into each other. Parts of this campaign will ask Leeds to scrap as hard as they play.

Bielsa’s squad, in their defence, have the physicality to do that. And they can play considerably better than they have either side of a spirited draw with Everton, a match which showed far more of the traits commended by Klopp and Guardiola. These are the weeks of the season where Bielsa’s squad routinely go to town, with vigour, flamboyance and a refreshed outlook. The opening forays of this term have given him more to think about, a swing in the balance of who is bossing who. In part it comes down to the thing that has always lit the fire for him at Leeds: spark.

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