If Leeds are adept at one thing, it’s fighting fire with fire - The Athletic 10/2/22

By Phil Hay

“What’s been demanded is what I’ve done the least.”

Not quite the words of Limmy, one of Scotland’s comedians de jour, but words cut from the same cloth as those which turned Limmy into a meme: Don’t back down. Double down.

Another week in Yorkshire and another week of chat about what is going on up front at Leeds United.

Patrick Bamford became a father overnight on Sunday but there was no mention of that a few hours later as Marcelo Bielsa spent part of his Monday morning press conference revisiting a battleground which, for all its complexity, smells of little other than Joe Gelhardt. There is, it seems, no end of metrics where Gelhardt scores highly: expected goals, expected assists and expected debates.

Outside of Bielsa’s domain, there are many who would like to tell him that Gelhardt needs to carry the baton at centre-forward while Bamford, alongside babygrows and night feeds, tries to shake off a foot injury so he can add to his five Premier League starts so far this season. That swell of opinion has been rising for months and if it ever seems that Bielsa is oblivious to what is being said, written or tweeted about him, look once more at how a question about Dan James starting at No 9 handbrake-turned into his Leeds coach admitting that by using Gelhardt so late in last month’s 1-0 defeat to Newcastle United, he had gone against the tide.

Nothing in what was said suggested Bielsa was for turning. People are shouting for Gelhardt, he said, but pre-game and in-game, that call is his alone and if three and half years of Bielsa’s management have taught Leeds fans anything, it is that most of his decisions are impervious to noise on the outside.

More than that, noise on the outside tends to deepen his commitment to his own views. Should he have used Gelhardt earlier against Newcastle? “The decision I didn’t make can’t be verified,” he said. “Because it can’t be verified, the critique of it acquires value.” Hardly the sound of a head coach conceding ground.

The debate is not solely about Gelhardt’s inclusion or exclusion, even if the 19-year-old is the shiniest toy in town. It is about Bamford and the hole he leaves up front when he doesn’t play. It is about Tyler Roberts and the part of Bielsa which sees more in him than the crowd looking on does. It is about goals, results and a desire to get out of this season unscathed; to wit, by utilising the most extreme talent available. Leeds are not in “relying on scorelines elsewhere” territory but the bottom rungs of the Premier League were tight enough to make Tuesday’s round of matches, preceding their trip to Aston Villa 24 hours later, pertinent. It would suit them to consign Newcastle 3-1 Everton to the bin of fixture irrelevance.

At Villa Park, there was no backing down and no hint of it either: James up front again as part of the same XI as Bielsa set sail with against Newcastle. When the Argentinian turned to his bench near the end of the box-office 3-3 draw that unfolded from there, Roberts emerged ahead of Gelhardt.

The thinking at the outset, no doubt, was that James’ turn of pace and butcher’s-dog stamina would hassle Villa’s centre-backs while giving Leeds another outlet on the counter if they were able to turn over the home side’s narrow wingers, otherwise known as a pair of No 10s. Adam Forshaw might have helped with the second aspect but, fit again after a hamstring injury, Bielsa named him only on the bench.

Ten minutes in, retractions of criticism poured from all directions.

Rodrigo did some poaching on the edge of the box, dispossessing Tyrone Mings, and his inside ball, the first of numerous clever passes, was whipped inside the far post by James, struck with perfect accuracy. Rodrigo, who isn’t great at pressing and James, who isn’t really a No 9, did it all in the time it took Villa to blink. Inwardly, Bielsa might have performed a mental knee slide. Outwardly, he sat sipping a tea.

The early movement of his attacking players was not to Villa’s liking and as James drifted right to smash a cross off goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez’s body and then left to force a stretched clearing header from Lucas Digne, the Welshman’s part in the rotations made Bielsa’s logic clearer.

Villa looked like scoring from every corner they took, able to guide them onto the head of Mings, but as they prepared to deliver, James took to placing himself on the halfway line in preparation for a clearance which set up a race for the ball. That unpredictability, and Rodrigo’s searching range of distribution, left Villa wondering which direction the next stab would come from.

In short, it showed how the arrangement could flourish and why Bielsa was persisting. A burst from Jack Harrison set up another chance for James on the half-hour mark, one he cracked against the top of the crossbar from 20 yards, but from switched-on status, Leeds switched off seconds later, making a mess of a throw-in and leaving Philippe Coutinho unmarked. At a favourable range, Coutinho swept a low shot beyond Illan Meslier, happy to cash in.

That equaliser snuffed Leeds’ candle out temporarily and lit Coutinho’s own.

That is a wonderful finish from Leeds United's Dan James! 💛

The 24-year-old Welshman's third goal of the season takes the wind out of Aston Villa's sails. pic.twitter.com/d4m4XTMuPn

— Football on BT Sport (@btsportfootball) February 9, 2022

In the 38th minute, the Brazilian turned Luke Ayling on halfway and fed Jacob Ramsey with a killer ball, which the youngster converted. Six minutes later, Ramsey left an off-colour Raphinha trailing on the other side of the pitch to collect another Coutinho pass and smash it into the roof of Meslier’s net. No nonsense and no panic — which looked like setting in among Bielsa’s side.

That was Leeds’ season typified: glimpses of seductive promise lost to moments of weakness, the latter killing the former.

Last night’s first half was thoroughly out of control when James’ close-range header, presented to him by Rodrigo’s deflected cross, brought the scoreline back to 3-2 in added time. Thoughts flooded back to an away win by that scoreline here at Villa Park just before Christmas 2018 when nothing was settled until the very last swing of Kemar Roofe’s boot.

A swing of Diego Llorente’s just past the hour brought the scoreline level again and there it stayed, despite a late red card shown to Ezri Konsa and riotous effort on the part of both teams to squeeze out a winner.

Leeds scored three times here last season too, on a day where they wiped the floor with Villa. On Wednesday, three goals sent them home with a draw and a feeling they had been short-changed. And in that, there was a point that got lost in the debate over how Bielsa should structure his front line.

Leeds have three clean sheets in Premier League games this season. They have shipped 43 goals, which is close enough to the worst defensive record in the division (Norwich City’s 46). They are liable to splinter when teams burn through their midfield and liable to trade a lead for a deficit in no time, albeit with the capacity still to fight back. They have not been able to afford themselves the light relief of an easy night’s work.

An attack as consistently slick as yesterday’s would help to take them up the league from their current 15th place but it is brittleness defensively that is keeping them in harm’s way.