Leeds United owner Andrea Radrizzani and board made fully aware of fierce Alfred Schreuder feeling - YEP 13/2/23

A week after sacking Jesse Marsch Leeds United find themselves in peril of straying from the common ground they discovered with supporters.

By Graham Smyth

Two and a half years have flown by since the Whites won promotion to the Premier League with Marcelo Bielsa at the helm and everyone at Elland Road received their flowers for making it happen. There was serious credit to be dished out, from the ownership down to the players and grumbles over senior managerial missteps were put aside to celebrate together, albeit not in person.

A fine first season in the Premier League allowed Andrea Radrizzani to keep talking about the dream of jetting off on European adventures and taking the club stratospheric, only for a 2021/22 season stall to bring relations between the board and the fans crashing back to earth. Ejecting Bielsa only pushed the decision makers and the fanbase further apart and though Marsch gamely tried to drag the two together, he never really shook off the 'their man, not our man' tag.

Ironically, he only ever helped the board to get on the same page as supporters by getting himself sacked. For the first time in a long time, Marsch's exit brought those around the boardroom table and those in the stands into alignment. But a week is a long time in football and at Elland Road the past seven days has felt like an eternity because for all the talk of highly-rated top-level European coaches and Radrizzani's white smoke tweets, what has materialised is a grand amount of nothing.

Michael Skubala, the club's Under 21s coach, was the man in charge for both games against Manchester United and even the appearance at Elland Road of a managerial candidate for the second of those fixtures has failed to bring clarity to the situation. If anything, Alfred Schreuder's LS11 sighting - confirmed after full-time when he was led to the West Stand by Victor Orta's number two Gaby Ruiz - has driven a greater wedge between the powers that be and a support whose power, when harnessed, can be transformational for the club.

Simply put, there hasn't so much been a reaction to the possibility of Schreuder coming in, but a fierce backlash. A tidal wave of negativity on social media does not always reflect an entirely accurate picture yet when the owner himself uses Twitter as a means to keep fans 'posted' then it becomes a conduit through which sentiment can be expressed to Radrizzani.

His social media activity has long made clear that he reads it. He has reacted to it enough times that it can be said, unequivocally, that he will be aware that Leeds fans do not want Schreuder. That image of Ajax fans holding aloft banners bearing their exasperation with Schreuder will be seared into his brain. There is no conceivable scenario in which the board are not tuned in to the ongoing discord.

Speak to Leeds fans, reasonable, fair-minded match-going Leeds fans and they'll tell you that their opposition to the Dutchman is not simply the scale of how badly he fared at Ajax, where he was reported to have lost the dressing room, it's the warnings of supporters at former clubs and his struggles elsewhere - he was also sacked by FC Twente and Hoffenheim - and it's frustration at where the club finds itself, considering an apparently underwhelming appointment, a full week after sacking Marsch.

There's also the fact that he does not meet the initial brief. Leeds were clear that their shortlist, which included Rayo Vallecano's Andoni Iraola and then expanded to explore Arne Slot's availability, were all managers in work. Schreuder, plainly, was not on the shortlist and there was always a danger, if the hunt wasn't immediately successful, that Leeds' next turn would be perceived as desperation. Iraola could not be extracted from his LaLiga club, not in a manner the coach would be comfortable with, and Slot turned down the Whites in a most public display of loyalty to Feyenoord. So here Leeds are, desperately needing a manager.

And amid a reaction that pales only in significance and ferocity to badgegate and Bielsa's sacking, the board will be asking themselves how possible it now is to elevate Schreuder from a hopeful candidate to Leeds United head coach. What grace period would he realistically be granted and how toxic could things get should he take the reins and steer the Whites to anything but victories over Everton and Southampton? Revolt would only ever be just around the wrong corner.

Marsch might not have accepted Leeds' relegation-threatened status but the fans did and the board did - that's why they sacked their man. That and the strength of feeling in the away end at the City Ground. They read the room and showed Marsch the door. A week later, it's being made abundantly clear that there is no room for Schreuder.

Radrizzani, Angus Kinnear, Victor Orta and co have long recognised the vital role supporters play, particularly when the Leeds team needs them and they will need them more than ever in the coming weeks. Losing the fans through a wildly unpopular appointment is playing with fire at a time when patience is tinder-dry.

The YEP understands that, as of Monday morning, Schreuder was a man among options and not the only option. As Skubala said, an appointment would be helpful for everyone because with two enormous games and a dog fight on the road ahead, the direction of travel needs to be made clear. Time is not on the board's side but it feels very much like they're faced with a choice between taking Schreuder on the journey with them, or the fans.