'It's a tough habit to break' - Leeds United coach on challenge for 'perfect fit' Jesse Marsch - YEP 30/3/22

Mark Jackson says it will take time for Leeds United to break old habits and learn new ones but he believes Jesse Marsch's style of play is 'perfect' for the club.

By Graham Smyth

The interim first team coach, promoted from the Under 23s when the American arrived a month ago, is providing somewhat of a link between the old and the new at Thorp Arch.

Jackson worked closely with Marcelo Bielsa's staff, preparing young players for first team involvement and steeping the academy hopefuls in Bielsaball.

His Under 23s played the same brand of football that took both the Championship and Premier League by storm during Bielsa's era, before the Argentine was sacked following a poor run of results.

Marsch was due to arrive in the summer but club owner Andrea Radrizzani accelerated his succession plan and introduced the new man with a dozen games left in the Premier League season.

One of the key reasons director of football Victor Orta earmarked Marsch as the man to follow Bielsa into the Elland Road dugout was the stylistic similarities between their two philosophies.

Implementing a new style, no matter how similar it might be, in a short space of time is still going to be a tricky task but Jackson feels Marsch's way of playing will fit like a glove.

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"The style of play he's going to bring to the club, you've probably seen already, that front-foot football, pressing, that counter-pressing, that aggression on the ball, to me that's Leeds United," Jackson told the club's official podcast."I always used to say if teams want to play football against us we'll play football, if they want to fight us no problem we'll have that fight and win that battle. That style he's trying to continue and tweak a little bit fits perfectly with what the fans expect. It's going to take a little bit of time to get it really, really right, we've got to do that quickly but it's going to fit perfectly."

Under Marsch Leeds have set up in a 4-2-2-2 and sought to be more compact, defensively, yet the imprint of the new head coach is yet to significantly transform the side. Their two wins, over Norwich and Wolves, owed more to character and fight than any tactical intervention. What is noticeable, however, is that Leeds now attempt to press the ball from an organised structure rather than following individuals around the pitch as they did in Bielsa's man-to-man marking system. That tactic, which was unique to both the Championship and English top flight, was often cited by Bielsa's peers as a chief factor in Leeds' ability to be both a physically demanding and awkward opposition side. But it began to draw criticism in the final days and weeks of Bielsa's tenure as his team were pulled apart and leaked goals at an alarming rate.

Marsch, who instantly moved the team to a more zonal marking system, has referenced moments when players reverted to their former ways, particularly in the beating by Aston Villa Jackson says that unlearning old habits is a difficult thing, so the current international break came at a good time.

"We're under no illusions we have to implement it firstly at first team level as quickly as possible and we're doing that every day," said Jackson.

"There's a lot of similarities between how they play. The main thing, man marking, we need to come away from under Jesse. It's a tough habit to break, when something has been engrained well into the group, which it was, and been really successful, those habits and behaviours are hard to break. We're doing it step-by-step, every day we're trying to implement things. Jesse has done a lot of video analysis with the players, with the injury situation we're nursing a lot of players and that's a challenge as well, we can't just spend hours out on the training ground, we have to manage players' loads and miss certain players. We're doing it step by step, this international period will be a vital part for the players who remained with us. We can start to embed those ideas and what we're looking for with the style of play."

Just as the team and the fans have to get used to a new set-up, Marsch and his two incoming staff members, Franky Schiemer and Cameron Toshack, have to acclimatise to Leeds United, having had eye-opening experiences courtesy of the supporters in their first few weeks in charge.

"I can remember coming out of the hotel and we were going to the home game and Franky said to me 'we've got all these fans outside the hotel clapping and we got beat the last game,'" said Jackson.

"I said this is how it is, this is what it's like. I said after the Norwich game welcome to Leeds, get used to this. The atmosphere was unbelievable, I think they were taken aback a bit and Jesse has managed in the Champions League in huge games. I'm used to that, that's what I see as Leeds United, that connection between the fans, the club and the city. Hopefully we can continue to grow that further."