Jesse Marsch before Crystal Palace says his way is to live, love and be happy - The Square Ball 21/4/22

KNEE BOTHER

Written by: Moxcowhite • Daniel Chapman

Meeting the press to talk about the upcoming game against Crystal Palace, Jesse Marsch brought an elephant of his own making into the room with him, that if it could speak would say the Leeds players were “physically, mentally, emotionally and psychologically in a difficult place to recover” after Marcelo Bielsa’s “overtraining”, just like Marsch did on Talksport last week. Jesse wanted to address this early, before taking any questions:

“I haven’t spoken at all since the comments I made on Talksport, about overtraining and Marcelo. And listen, I want to say that this was not intentional to attack Marcelo in any way. It was a little bit careless, and I can see how it was interpreted in some ways that way. But it was more about the state of the player pool, and what I had observed, and trying to help take the team forward. And I think you’d be hard pressed to find an incoming coach that has spoken more positively about the person he replaced than the way that I have spoken about Marcelo. And it’s because I have major respect for him. So I haven’t said anything about anything after that, and I’ve seen a little bit of the response. But I want to make sure that, again, the respect for Marcelo, that everyone understands that was at a very, very high level from me and from everyone here.”

Okay! That should be enough for most people to move on, except this being Leeds United, karma has other ideas. Say anything about injuries in training and only one thing will happen next — the elephant will trample Adam Forshaw’s knee:

“Injury update, we had an unfortunate injury with Adam Forshaw two days ago. He was back in training and he took a knock in a collision on his kneecap, and unfortunately fractured the kneecap. It’s a six week injury, so that puts him out for the season.”

Absolutely textbook inevitable Leeds United at its purest. Marsch says Forshaw still has an important part to play this season, by doing more of what he did at Watford, when he wasn’t fit to play but it was cool to have him around:

“We brought him [to Watford] thinking maybe there was a small chance that we could consider him [to play], but it was mostly to be around the team, to be there in the hotel, the pregame meetings, to be there before the match, to make sure that he had an impact on the preparation for the game. I believe in leaders, I believe in — I try to give room for the players that are leaders in the team to contribute to be a part of decision making, and to take ownership of the environment and of the team.”

Can’t tackle or pass though can he? Fortunately we have a plan for that:

“The one silver lining we have is that Kalvin’s back to 100 per cent. So Kalvin will start the match on Monday. So, you know, it’s obviously never good to lose an important player. But we have a little bit of luck in the situation that we can bring Kalvin into the mix.”

That is good! The other injury news is like this:

“Patrick Bamford, who’s making good progress, and has been running on the AlterG and should be on the pitch next week. And Tyler Roberts is also making good progress.”

It’s an anti-gravity treadmill, before you ask! Marsch went on to say Bamford is still on track to be fit for the last two games of the season:

“I think he’s exactly on track for where we had hoped he would be. We’re trying to be cautious and aggressive at the same time. That’s always the balancing act, a little bit, for getting those guys back. I think one of the things that you have to give credit to the medical team here [for] is their statistics that show that we’ve had a lot of injuries over the past year, but that we get players to return quicker than a lot of places do. And I think that’s a credit to the medical staff and what they’ve been able to accomplish. So, for example, Junior Firpo came back much quicker than we had thought he would.”

I mean, last week Jesse was saying the players were “physically, mentally, emotionally and psychologically in a difficult place to recover”, but now we’ve got stats that say they recover faster than at other places? And dear reader, you want me to drop this and move on? Let’s do that.

Here’s the rest of all the things:

It would have been nice to keep playing after the Watford game, but the break has been useful time to get more players healthy and prepare for the rest of the season

Marsch told the players their adaptation to his ideas is ahead of schedule: “We’ve changed the way we train, the way we play, the tactics, the way we interact. Here at Thorp Arch, they have to get used to my leadership style, my way of communicating. And I can only say that I’ve never had a group that has adapted and given more than what they have”

Crystal Palace have “a lot of quality players that are very dangerous in 1v1 situations and in transition moments, and they have a really good coach” and he wouldn’t be drawn on whether beating them could drag them into the relegation battle

He also wisely wouldn’t comment on which teams are in the relegation battle, just that he expected the table to tighten up before we played again, and it has

About Sean Dyche being sacked by Burnley, “You never like to see managers lose their jobs, you know, everybody puts a lot into this, and especially when a manager has big history and it has meant a lot to the club. You know, I said that here with Marcelo, too, but this is the business we live in and everyone has to try to do the best that they can”, and be sure to chalk that up as one of the nice things he’s said about Bielsa because he seemed quite keen to drop those in today (for some reason!)

About his rivalry with Patrick Vieira in New York, it’s got a weird vibe to me because it was about a MLS franchise owned by Red Bull playing a MLS franchise owned by Manchester City’s owners and wearing their colours and knock-off badge, but Marsch says it was part of the script: “When he first made the decision to come to MLS, we were all excited to have somebody of his stature in the league. And then when he came to New York City FC, it meant that I had to hate him. But he’s not an easy guy to hate, because first of all, from an expertise and a work perspective, he’s very good, a very good coach”

Over time they “grew to really respect each other” and it sounds like Gerard Houllier got involved to tell them to chill out with all the hate. “We have new groups now and it’ll be a little bit of a clash of styles.” And Jesse we’re not much arsed about Crystal Palace in general so no need to hate the guy anymore on our account. Save it for Frank Lampard!

Asked about what tactical changes he’s been working on, which he gets asked pretty much every week, Marsch talked instead about the good and bad in the last match: “The defensive performance in Watford was very good. There were things we felt we could have done better with the ball and build up phases. And in the last third, we’re continuing to try to push them with the intensity of winning balls, of counter-pressing, of limiting the opponent in transition moments and then still trying to be creative and have poise in the last third of the pitch, so that we can again create more chances and more goals. But to win 3-0 at Watford, I think it was a very important result for us, and a step forward for us”

He’s been trying to get some ideas over to Kalvin Phillips, “about the intensity at which I think he can play against the ball, and then the ease and the clarity that he can play with the ball, and getting that balance right, and the ability to kind of shift gears from one thing to the next. And he’s been great in training. He had a really good training week. He’s fully fit”

Marsch isn’t paying any attention to speculation about Kalvin and transfers or contracts: “I don’t speak much with agents. I don’t speak much in broad perspective with players about their careers. They have plenty of people around them to do that”

While injured, Phillips has still been keen: “The kind of injury that he had was a serious one. I think, when any player experiences that kind of injury, the first thing is you have to become selfish and try to do everything you can to keep yourself healthy again. But since I’ve been here, even though he wasn’t in training from the beginning, he was a big part of every day and every video session and every meeting, and his energy of being around the team was always massive. So I know that he’s excited”

Marsch is watching the games involving teams around us — like me, he grew older watching Burnley lose to Southampton last night — but not with any expectations, because we can only control ourselves, and expecting less than best efforts from other teams “would be foolish and naive”

He’s excited about the Under-23s match tonight, and the support it’s getting from the 18,000 going, and while he wouldn’t give Andy Taylor’s line-up away he said, “we’ll try to measure the minutes for the guys that play in a way that that keeps them ready and fresh for us come Monday”

He chuckled hearing that Charlie Cresswell says he’ll be a first team player when he’s played fifty games; “I consider him a first team player now,” says Marsch. “Even in the first training session I had, he was the loudest player on the pitch. He’s not shy, he doesn’t shy away from big moments, just like he [showed] against Wolves. He needs to play, right? He’s a young, talented player that has big potential as a leader of our club”

Young players coming through from the Academy are important, and Marsch says that’s one of the reasons he’s here: “If you want to produce young, brave players, then the person that has to be the bravest is the first team coach, and you have to believe in young players. You have to put them on the pitch and you have to challenge them to be their best. I had a long talk with Sam Greenwood and Joffy today about their role in the team and how much I believe in them and how important they are”

More on this: “Me being here is also, I think, a signal to the Academy that we believe in youth development and that, as a club, we’re committed to developing players” — and before anyone says anything! — “much like Marcelo was and his attention to what was going on with the 23s and in the academy.” Good save, Jesse, argument avoided!

(Although he did then say: “I don’t want to be the one making decisions about line-ups, I don’t want to be the one making decisions about what they do in training every day, and what kind of subs to make” — which is all stuff Bielsa used to do with the Under-23s. But this is fine, it’s okay that they’re different! Respectfully different! This is normal and fine)

Ian Poveda looks 100 per cent fit again, has been training well, and everyone’s keen for him to help Blackburn in their last three games (not least them, I guess, given they’ve been paying a portion of wages all the time he was injured and apparently that limited their ability to afford a replacement… oops)

The break over Easter has been good because the ‘international breaks’ aren’t really any such thing for international players — so they got an extra day off, “Then came back and had a really strong week of training. And that’s my way of work, I always think no matter what your job is, work life balance is really important. We all have lives to lead, and families to love and enjoy. And then when we come here, we intensively work here in a way that makes us feel good about the work ethic we have, the motivation for each other, the mentality to try to achieve as much as we possibly can so that we’re maximising potential. I think my way is to try to get the best out of both worlds. And to have healthy, happy players that know that their commitment is really valued here and that we care about them”

And that’s where it ended, just about, because to bookend the start of the press conference livestream on YouTube — three minutes of journos having a chit-chat about Ned Boulting’s upcoming book and the flooding of an apartment building foyer in Saltaire — at the end we got some of the embargoed section that is held back for the Sunday papers before the stream cut off. So look forward to at least one article over the weekend about Rodrigo’s confidence.