Patrick Bamford: A symbol of what Leeds and their flawed ideas have become - The Athletic 16/5/23
By Phil Hay
Somewhere in Marcelo Bielsa’s possessions is an England
shirt signed by Patrick Bamford. Irrespective of whether it is an England shirt
or the England shirt — the actual match-worn top from Bamford’s one
international appearance — it is a memento of a time when both of them seemed
to have no ceiling.
Bamford gave Bielsa that shirt because the Argentinian’s
football had taken him to the threshold of England recognition. Bielsa saw
acknowledgement from Gareth Southgate as solely Bamford’s doing and said more
than once that Leeds United would not have been the team they were without him
up front. There has hardly been a coach with more faith in Bamford, even if it
came to look as if the forward’s body could only take so much of the Bielsa
way.
That, sadly, is the image of him now: a footballer who once
led the line for an esteemed thinker who would stoically stand by him, reduced
to the level of trying to show that he has some of the old fibre left.
It is not that Bamford was never prone to missing chances.
Anyone with any knowledge of Leeds can reel off names of goalscorers before him
at the club who were more prolifically reliable and comparatively deadly but,
whatever his limitations, the truth of Bielsa’s side at its best was that it
worked with Bamford in it.
And if you asked Bielsa, it worked because Bamford was in
it. That was why Eddie Nketiah could not get much of a kick during what was
meant to be a full season on loan, why the young forward extricated himself
from Elland Road in January 2020 and went home to Arsenal ahead of time.
The truth of it, also, is that Bamford was worth a go with
England, for all that he was only able to dip his toe into those waters. But
that was then and this is no longer then.
The current image of him is quite uncomfortable to watch;
Bamford changed and not for the better, big moments counting against him and
his club, influence waning and abuse rising from fools who need parental
controls imposed on their mobiles and their lives. And all the while the
thought that he is indicative of what Leeds have become, a victim of flawed
ideas which left him and others painfully exposed.
This is the second season running in which Bamford had been
grasping for form, fitness and goals. And yet, as it draws to an end with
everything on the line, he is playing up front and Leeds are counting on him
doing what he hasn’t really done dependably since 2021.
Three years on from promotion and Leeds’ go-to option at
centre-forward is still the same bloke he was then, despite the fact injuries
consumed him in Bielsa’s curtailed final season and have not let up completely
in this one either; despite the fact Leeds have been going backwards from the
summer of 2021 onwards. Might the pecking order not have evolved in that time?
The same point could be made about Adam Forshaw, a
midfielder new head coach Sam Allardyce clearly rates and would probably use in
every remaining minute this season if he could. But Allardyce’s preferred pick
is one who, because of drawn-out injuries going back a long time, was too much
of a risk to start against Newcastle on Saturday so only played the second
half. “It’s a delicate play with Adam,” Allardyce admitted, and it is amazing
how a brand new coach can sound like a stuck record. Forshaw’s is a perennially
managed situation, never fully solving itself.
Thinking about what Bamford or Forshaw would be if the world
was perfect is fine — Bielsa genuinely reckoned a prime, unhindered Forshaw was
Champions League material — but no competent club, or no club in good shape,
gets into a position where it looks at players who have felt the strain
individually for longer than is good for them and relies on them as if they
were safe bets. It is like clinging to ideals which do not exist.
Bamford’s missed penalty in that draw with Newcastle was
costly, and Rodrigo should have taken it. In the circumstances and on the
merits of their respective form, the percentage play was to give it to the
forward who had been in the habit of scoring. But even Rodrigo’s starting
position at the weekend, wider in a front three, told a story, as did another
afternoon of nothing from £35million ($42.6m) January signing Georginio Rutter
on the bench.
How is it that after all that has gone on, for Bamford and
the club, so much in attack is still resting on him?
It is hard not to deduce that two years of physical issues
have stripped the now 29-year-old of the ability to do what he did for Bielsa
to the same standard: to run the channels in the same way, to provide as much
of a focal point, to get on the end of so many chances (which, in fairness,
Leeds no longer create at the same rate anyway). And if confidence is
diminished then he is probably no different to Illan Meslier: self-assurance
weakened by numbers and performances which mount up negatively.
Perhaps Saturday’s penalty was a demonstration of where
Bamford is psychologically. Perhaps somebody on the pitch should have saved him
from himself. Perhaps Leeds truly need this wake-up call.
History should reflect that Bamford was good for Leeds. He
scored 16 goals in 2019-20 as they went up, then 17 in their first season after
promotion and, to this point, he has a combined total of 66 goals and assists
for them in league games. It might not be record-breaking but they are tidy
numbers and there was a time when Leeds were grateful for them, however much
anyone tried to beat him over the head with expected-goals ratios.
By far the saddest aspect of the Bielsa era is the way it
petered out: a manager gone before the crowd was ready to lose him, a fear
factor replaced by the knowledge that Leeds have big chinks in their armour,
the faces of that brilliant 2019-20 squad struggling to stop time catching up
on them.
Relegation can be avoided by something as simple as the
conversion of a penalty and a Premier League No 9 has to score in those
moments. But clubs do not go down because a single penalty was missed. Clubs go
down because they were inept enough to have so much staked on solitary kicks
from 12 yards.
In September, Bamford will reach the two-year anniversary of
what will surely be his only England cap, a goalless hour against Andorra in a
4-0 World Cup qualifying cruise at Wembley. It remains an example of what can
be done and of how much he, Bielsa and Leeds achieved together.
It would be nice if, in time, he was largely regarded as the
centre-forward who helped get Leeds promoted and who helped break that ceiling.
