Summerville’s rise to take Leeds’ No 10 shirt (then throw it away in delirious celebration) - The Athletic 1/11/22

By Phil Hay

Every pre-season in every dressing room, footballers barter over squad numbers. Most prefer to stick with their existing shirts. Some would like to swap. Certain players consider their number a brand, others could not care less.

It was no different at Leeds United last summer and the focus of attention when the club issued their squad list was Crysencio Summerville landing No 10 — a 20-year-old development squad winger without a league start in England taking one of the game’s most prestigious slots. Ten was vacant because in early July, Leeds had sold its previous holder Raphinha: star asset, Brazil international, made for it in almost every way.

Summerville was on the fringes of the first team at Elland Road and at a very different stage of his career. He wore 38 in the 2021-22 season and before this term began, he had eyes on number seven. It was nominally Ian Poveda’s shirt but Poveda was about to leave Leeds on loan. But before long, Brenden Aaronson arrived from Red Bull Salzburg, laid claim to seven himself and left 10 as the only traditional starting number up for grabs. It was waiting for someone to take it, so Summerville did.

The confidence of a player so inexperienced accepting an aesthetic burden was duly noted, not least at Anfield on Saturday where Summerville’s involvement from the start introduced him to a wider audience who might not have known much about him. But to his credit, he dwelt on the significance of his squad number. Before going for it, he spoke to other players at Leeds about it. He approached the club’s captain, Liam Cooper, to ask if there would be any objection to him wearing it or whether he might be making a mistake. Cooper gave his approval. Summerville was likely to break through before long and the club did not think the shirt was wildly at odds with his potential anyway.

It was swinging around his head in the 89th minute at Anfield, launched into the air as Summerville tried to comprehend the goal he had scored. If adopting 10 was inviting pressure then that moment against Liverpool, his pulsating winner, proved he could carry it — Summerville holding his nerve and his balance to apply three deft touches to a bouncing ball, stabbing it into the bottom corner of the net. With that finish, Leeds snatched a 2-1 win, a result they so badly needed. Summerville turned 21 the next day and before kick-off, Leeds’ assistant, Rene Maric, had told him he would score. It was a night that bordered on perfection in a campaign which has been far from that.

Summerville flew to Holland early on Sunday morning to see his family in Rotterdam and celebrate his birthday. It has been quite a year for him; a year of friction, patience, development, progress and, as of Saturday, sensation. He has gone from a situation in January where he was trying to talk his way out of Elland Road on loan to a position where his performance in training and under-21s fixtures compelled Jesse Marsch to play him. Leeds’ head coach was under immense strain last week, fighting for his job, and perhaps an injury to Luis Sinisterra influenced him as much as anything else. But at Anfield, with Leeds down in the Premier League’s relegation places, it was Summerville who stepped into his starting line-up. And Summerville who won the match.

The scenario was far removed from the start of the year when, with meaningful first-team minutes eluding him, Summerville went directly to Marsch’s predecessor, Marcelo Bielsa, and asked if he could move elsewhere temporarily. Hamburg were making offers for him and AZ Alkmaar had been heavily linked, too, but speaking so frankly was risky and bold. Bielsa’s managerial style involved limited personal interaction with his players. There were few who spoke to him directly or often. Summerville’s request was met with an emphatic response: if he wanted to leave then he should leave. Bielsa was only interested in total commitment and was not going to try to talk him round.

Despite that, Leeds blocked Summerville’s departure. The January deadline was about to pass and they had nothing coming in from the transfer market, no replacement to keep the squad at the level of strength it was already at. Bielsa said publicly the decision to keep Summerville was entirely down to the board and the former Feyenoord trainee did not play again until April, by which point Bielsa had been sacked and replaced by Marsch. The American watched him and took to him and it was agreed over the summer that if Raphinha left, as everyone expected him to, Summerville would be a more active part of the senior group.

Contract talks were opened with him and parts of the negotiations revolved around Leeds’ immediate plans for him. Summerville was happy to sign on to 2026 and did so in early August, but if he wasn’t going to play then a loan made more sense to him. Anderlecht were one of the sides interested in taking him. Nottingham Forest, newly promoted from the Championship, were understood to have been aggressive in talking about permanent bids for Summerville, but he was not interested in leaving Elland Road full-time.

Summerville’s performance in pre-season sessions was consistent and, before long, Marsch was telling him it was becoming harder and harder to overlook him. He got his full Premier League league debut away at Leicester 12 days ago and prior to it, Marsch had spoken more than once about the obligation he felt to give him “more minutes”. Leeds’ troubling form did not dissuade the American from gambling on him.

Summerville has trickery, pace and a direct style of running which keeps full-backs busy and asks questions of them. How good he can be will be better answered by a larger number of extended appearances, but it will not be easy for Marsch to react to Summerville’s winning goal at Anfield by leaving him on the bench against Bournemouth this weekend. “We know we have a good player on our hands,” Marsch said. “Honestly, the biggest thing with him is discipline, professionalism, work ethic, maximising the potential of what it is in this world of professional football — and not thinking about all the other stuff that gets in the way of really developing.”

Summerville’s finish at Anfield came a week on from the first Premier League goal of his career, scored in a 3-2 defeat to Fulham. That strike — a reactive tap-in after a through-ball from Joe Gelhardt — came so late and on an afternoon which threatened profound consequences for Marsch that it passed without much attention. At full-time, Summerville gave his shirt away to a fan who had turned up to Elland Road with a Dutch flag. But on Saturday, on Merseyside, the No 10 top was his, tucked away safely as a permanent memento of the best birthday present he could have asked for.