Leeds United 4-0 Blackpool: The best day of your summer - The Square Ball 8/7/22

NO GRAY SKIES

Written by: Moxcowhite • Daniel Chapman

If you’re looking for optimism in these turbulent and uncertain times, why not consider an opening pre-season friendly at the end of summer in the sun-dappled outskirts of the historic city of York? Leeds United, with a bunch of new signings in the stands, some first team internationals still resting, but enough on the pitch to excite and delight against two elevens’ worth of Sky Bettery from Blackpool, will never look better in your imagination than they do right now. Part of the challenge the Peacocks have this summer is keeping everyone in a good mood through the sales of Kalvin Phillips and (probably) Raphinha. They’re doing alright so far.

The night belonged to Archie Gray, who played the most minutes of anyone, into the realms of cramp and getting duffed up by cloggers. Callum Connolly, a 24 year old already on his eighth club, was chief bully of the second half, leaving elbows and shoes all over the young players Richard Keogh, moving as stiffly as if he was still staggering away from that crashed car, couldn’t catch in the first half. It feels somehow taboo to speak too much of Gray, who ought to be a secret at this time, but Victor Orta couldn’t hold his excitement on a podcast interview last season and any policy of hush won’t make it through the season, especially not now Jesse Marsch says he plans to put him in the Premier League soon. He’s sixteen! But he is amazing. Gray’s contribution to the scoring was an overhead up ‘n’ under, putting a cleared corner back into the six yard box where Joe Gelhardt tidied his feet up and let Rodrigo finish, and ten years from now it will be replayed with ominous music as bewildered YouTubers froth over how Archie had eyes in the back of his Champions League winning legend’s head back when he was just a teen. Otherwise, Gray was just all over the pitch being very good, putting in his most accomplished performance since the ‘Real history, real future, real choice’ season ticket campaign video for 2015/16.

Yes that’s really Archie, aged about nine. Try not to sob at the bit when he runs in between real Uncle Eddie and Leeds-Uncle Norman. For various reasons I was by the side of the pitch while this was filmed (look close and you can see me in the background) and I’m sure I used to have a video of Alex Mowatt pushing him over after being dribbled around once too often, but can’t find it now. (I also remember all the kids nutmegging Charlie Taylor, who seemed to be having a bad day.) Even at the time, people were saying to keep Archie’s presence quiet because Barcelona were hovering. They didn’t get him then, and they couldn’t afford him now. Well, they can’t afford anyone now, but you know what I mean.

Marc Roca was alongside Gray in the 4-2-3-1 against Blackpool and his left foot delighted me. I’m not sure about the way he flew into some tackles, like if Dan James was big enough to do damage, but perhaps Gray will get his minutes from Roca’s suspensions. Blackpool’s right-back is still looking for a pass Roca slid behind him from deep as a surprise, and even in regular short passing (what we’ll call ‘Forshawing’) his left foot has that hefty quality you expect from closing the door of a Rolls Royce. The profound satisfaction of superior engineering. I would happily watch him kicking a ball against a wall.

He was sending Junior Firpo away with that pass, who spent a lot of time in Blackpool’s penalty area. He had a shot in the first couple of minutes, thought his cross had helped Gelhardt open the scoring a minute after that (someone was offside), then set up Robin Koch to do it instead on ten minutes by squaring from Jackie Harrison’s quick free-kick. Then Firpo added the second himself, heading Harrison’s corner in at the near post. The best part of these two goals was Richard Keogh rolling his eyeballs and shouting at all his teammates. He’s trying to play like Franz Beckenbauer these days, but, like, like Franz Beckenbauer these days, if you see what I mean.

Cody Drameh was getting very far forward down the other side too, and in the second half these attacking duties were taken over by Leif Davis and Jamie Shackleton, whose work in the box helped Mateo Joseph make it 4-0 with a deflected shot. So, to get tactical for a moment, there’s your width. Squeezed between the marauding full-backs were Gelhardt up front, with Harrison, Sam Greenwood and Rodrigo behind him, not going much wider than the eighteen yard box (because the full-backs had that part down). In the second half Amari Miller and Sean McGurk were either side of Archie Gray, behind Gelhardt then Joseph, until Charlie Allen replaced Gray. That second half meandered as it tends to in these games, due to substitutions (both teams), cloggers clogging (Blackpool’s second string) and drifting concentration (me). Blackpool basically did nowt until with ten minutes left they got one-on-one with Kristoffer Klaesson, who saved the shot with his leg.

You can’t ask for much more from the first pre-season friendly of the summer, and Jesse Marsch seemed happy enough:

“I think a lot of the things that we talked about, that we wanted to put into practise for this match, we did in a good way. I thought in the build-up phase we were pretty good, counter-pressing phase we were quite good, and then we were able to score on some set pieces and create some, I thought, pretty big advantages and chances. And then limited the opponent to almost nothing. So when you look at the performance, you can say it’s pretty close to complete … And I thought overall, you know, our fitness level is pretty good right now. Our concentration level and our understanding of the way we want to play was pretty good.”

I’m still trying to calibrate his positivity to my Yorkshire cynicism. Is ‘pretty good’ and ‘quite good’ his posi-vibes-only way of saying ‘totally rubbish’? More likely that he’s thinking better of gushing too much over a friendly work-out against Champo opponents, which is wise in one sense, but on the other hand, when better to do it? This is the best time of the season: Leeds have won 4-0, the youth players look amazing, the first new signing looks mint, the ones who haven’t played yet still look like GOATs on YouTube. Even playing in last season’s kit put this match into a zone of unreality where we can still imagine the new shirts will be so stylish Venezia will throw theirs right into a canal. Sun’s out, Leeds are going to win the Premier League, Raphinha might even get on the plane to Australia with us instead of going to Barcelona. Stay, Rapha! Why would you want to leave when you can play with Archie Gray every day?