What on earth are major players in Leeds United boardroom thinking as no-win scenario plays out - YEP 27/4/23

What on earth must Leeds United be thinking?

By Graham Smyth

The inner-most thoughts of all the major players in and around Elland Road - not you Weston McKennie's mate - would make for an utterly fascinating read.

We'll never get it of course, not right now and never all at once because rarely does anyone tell the whole ugly truth in football, a sport where egos simply could not handle it. Thiago Silva's very reasonable and well articulated thoughts on Chelsea's strategy and recruitment should have been met with quiet nods of affirmation but because the idea of someone saying what they think is so alien, the coverage read like a Stamford Bridge scandal.

The boots on the ground don't take aim at the suits upstairs, it's not the done thing and that isn't because footballers don't have thoughts on what is going on, it's just that when skin is gossamer thin it takes but a few words to turn fair criticism into a weeping sore. Then there's the drama, the headlines like 'bust up' and club badges with cracks down the middle. Hysterical stuff.

What we get, instead, are cliches, platitudes and slick matchday social media graphics that say absolutely nothing about how footballers really feel about their situation and that of their club. We do at least hear from players, in pre and post-match interviews, and we hear from managers too, yet when what people really want is not what's said but what's thought, the point of those interviews diminishes.

That's how it is at Leeds right now, players and Javi Gracia filing in to stand or sit in front of the cameras and answer the difficult questions, knowing the answers won't be nearly enough for the fans because they won't change the results or the league table.

Still, if Willy Gnonto was permitted to empty his thoughts into a microphone it would at least be interesting. If Gracia did the same when it comes to the make-up of the squad he inherited and the weaknesses and limitations he has had to contend with ever since, no one would switch off.

Putting aside for one moment the growing consternation with his stock answers on team selection and Gnonto in particular, the media furrow Gracia is ploughing right now is a lonely one. The point has been made before in YEP pages that most of the bullets coming his way don't bear his name and no one upstairs is contractually obliged to answer the media's questions.

The cessation of Angus Kinnear's programme notes has rendered the boardroom silent, to the public anyway. The CEO probably feels a bit like a punchbag, criticised over tone when he wrote them and then criticised for not writing them, but his honest thoughts on how a second consecutive season has got away from Leeds so alarmingly would be well worth a read.

What is Andrea Radrizzani thinking, right now, as the price he's going to receive for Leeds United teeters on the edge of Championship value? Where does he point the finger of blame for all of this, if not at himself as the ultimate decision maker?

How does Victor Orta feel, listening to the calls for Willy Gnonto, a player he signed but not one the manager is currently willing to use? How does he evaluate the lack of impact by record signing Georginio Rutter and weigh that against the youngster's future potential, if a present day disaster occurs? How does he feel as supporters lay their anger at his door over the aborted Jesse Marsch experiment? You would need a hide as thick as a rhino to sit in a directors box and hear your name in various chants, each of them unflattering and hurtful, but does the evaporation of supporter tolerance for his performance not make his job insufferable, if not untenable? When the fans made it clear they were done with Marsch, the board decided they were too.

The minds most worth reading at this point might actually be those of the American delegation in the Elland Road boardroom. Watching on as the Premier League club you intend to buy dices with top flight death must throw all sorts of thoughts into the mix and all kinds of plans up into the air.

You could say the 49ers have been a silent partner at Leeds, certainly when it comes to their intentions, but they must have some thoughts of their own on this shambles of a 2022/23 campaign, thoughts unvoiced in meetings this side of the pond but perhaps not on the other.

Even if the major boardroom players sat down this week in front of the press or the in-house cameras of LUTV, fans would never get the full answers to all of the above and right now what could be said would fall on deaf ears, ears flushed red with anger and frustration. That's a no-win situation. That's why if Leeds stay up only by virtue of the final day's results, there won't be the same scenes of jubilation we saw from decision makers at Brentford last year, how could there be? Survival was always the aim but staying up having run so close to disaster yet again would be scant justification for anyone in charge. A smile, an embrace, a wipe of the collective brow. Grim satisfaction.

How this season ends will determine who we hear from and how much is said, but when it does come time to speak, however illuminating or otherwise the statements might be, the only tone supporters will accept is humility. In any case, no one will be left wondering what it is the fanbase is thinking.