Leeds United indicator and 49ers Enterprises' creeping problem — Graham Smyth's Valencia verdict — YEP 4/8/24

By Graham Smyth

If the win over Valencia is any indicator at all then Leeds United have hit their stride in time for the Championship season but Daniel Farke's second half concern suggests complacency would be misplaced.

The Whites have impressed in their trio of friendlies against the kind of opposition you could expect to put up a fight. Two German second tier sides, one of which definitely looked far better than the other, and a top-half LaLiga outfit, were all made to look ordinary at times by Farke's men. The feeling around Elland Road and Thorp Arch is that the squad is in a good place and on the strength of the past fortnight that feeling meets the eye test. Even without Crysencio Summerville, Leeds were dangerous going forward against Schalke and Valencia, Mateo Joseph has lit the blue touch paper on excitement levels around his potential and Georginio Rutter will be a problem, again, for Championship defences. Ethan Ampadu has come back from the summer break with a snarl and added a nastiness to his game. Joe Rodon is a proper Leeds player now. Some of the back-to-front football has been aesthetically pleasing, some of the goals as pretty as any they scored last season and Saturday's team sheet showed a bench that had international experience and, in Joel Piroe and Patrick Bamford, a combined 2023/24 haul of 21 goals.

Against Valencia Leeds might have been expected to see a lot less of the ball and get a chance to work a bit more on their defensive duties. Illan Meslier, you might have thought, would be a lot busier than he had been in previous outings.

And yet despite a four-minute period from kick-off in which Leeds ran into some trouble or other the closer they got to halfway in possession, they soon worked their visitors out and began to exert pressure. That eventually led to a really nice first goal, at the end of a flowing move from deep in their own half. The left flank looked ominous early on and the ball went there en route to the net. Rutter's flick span over the head of a defender, he got it back from Junior Firpo and slid Joseph into the area, where the youngster cut inside a defender and finished expertly beyond Stole Dimistrievski. The game was essentially won when Joseph got enough of a bump on a ball-carrying central defender that he ran right into Rutter, who stripped the ball, ran to the area, jinked the last man and dinked a truly exquisite finish over Dimistrievski. The ball and two despairing defenders ended up in the net and Elland Road was remembering why it fell in love with the Frenchman last season.

There was lots to like in the performance, which even a last-minute deflected consolation for the Spaniards could not diminish. Some of it was familiar, like Rutter purring in all the right areas and going past players with ease or putting team-mates into the area with neat sliderule passes. Or like the quick restarts as Leeds sought to use the ball to exhaust their opponents. Or Ampadu dropping in next to the centre-backs and, like a quarter-back, throwing long range darts to try and put Dan James or Rutter in behind the back line.

Some of it was a sight for sore eyes, like Rodon and Pascal Struijk getting first contact on decent set-piece deliveries to threaten the goal. Ampadu's extra nastiness and the way in which Leeds kept their cool while Valencia lost their heads, showed a side to Farke's men that will need to be seen a lot more this season.

Joseph's pressing of defenders - which twice led to turnovers of possession - and his improved strength and hold-up play just about ended any argument against him starting when the real stuff begins next Saturday. Ilia Gruev, while plainly not a natural forward-thinking 8, did roam further forward and got involved nicely in some attacks.

It wasn't a perfect performance. Rodon had some accuracy issues when playing the ball down the right and Leeds could have been more ruthless in very decent positions. The second half saw some sloppiness creep in from goal-kicks and starting from the back with Meslier, which was a real drop off from the slick way in which they drew Valencia in and then bopped it round them in the first half.

But the sending off of the daft Rafa Mir and the histrionics of Hugo Duro, who was subbed off before he could be sent off, suggested Leeds had this game won handily both on the pitch and in the minds of the LaLiga side. Thoughts had already long-since turned to next week and the season ahead by the time Valencia got their goal. Farke's thoughts were there when Jayden Bogle went to ground for a second time after taking a heavy, late challenge. Presumably, what was running through his head was whatever the German is for 'I only have three natural full-backs and one is limping off and the other two have had extensive injuries in recent years.' There are areas of the squad in which Leeds do not currently have the depth to 'survive' as Farke put it, in the Championship. The squad, as it was on Saturday afternoon without the West Ham-bound Crysencio Summerville, is a good one and certainly among the very best in the second tier. It would take but one or two injuries however for Farke to run out of round pegs for round holes and start relying on versatility or kids.

Bogle, as it turns out, suffered what Leeds believe was nothing more than a simple dead leg and so he might even be fine to start against Portsmouth next week. Bamford, you will recall, had a simple bruise until he was missing weeks of action and heading for surgery. Even if Bogle's injury is such a straightforward one, the Championship season is far from straightforward. Look at the one just gone.

There is plenty to be excited about and both Joseph and Rutter embody that. There is, equally, plenty to worry about until such a time as Farke has the full-back, the central midfielder and at least one more attacker to help fill in the Summerville void, that he needs. His comments about working with 'pretty limited resources' despite the club raking in a transfer kitty of around £75m or more this summer, were always going to spark worry among fans. They jarred somewhat, conflicting a little with Paraag Marathe's post-play-off words that are still so fresh in the memory. "And so whether somebody yields or profit or not, we're going to be fine, and we're going to be able to do what we need to do to compete, to be the best team or one of the best teams on the pitch this coming season," he said. "That is not just my hope but my expectation."

It would be naive to expect a Championship club to be in for players valued at something like the £25m Summerville went for, because that's simply a Premier League bracket of talent for which the Whites cannot really compete. But surely, having spent around £12m on Piroe last summer they are resourced sufficiently to do similar again this time around? Because though a young Premier League loanee might come in and do enough in terms of goals and assists to help put Leeds in the top two, it would not a statement make. It would more closely resemble a risk than investment. And having allowed the fanbase to believe that the Archie Gray sale had put them in a position of strength and able to dictate terms, only to then reveal Summerville was the umpteenth clause-holding player and then have it said that resources to replace are limited, there is a perception issue creeping up around 49ers Enterprises. It’s one that their recruitment between now and the end of the window needs to dispel. So no one, at any level of Leeds United, can allow themselves to be complacent until the window can be called a success and the season ends in a way that backs that up. Pre-season has been good but the real work all lies ahead.