Trotting on.
Result verses Bolton.
A worrying tendency to seek fame.
Angus Kinnear.
VARsical.
VAR.
Moving targets.
Cibicki.
Captain Crowdplease.
Jansson.
Fowler to: David Prutton
David Prutton, midfield. Prutton was signed in August 2007 on a free having left Southampton that summer. Prutton played 67 league games (quite a few as sub) in 3 seasons before departing in January 2010 for Colchester United. The ex Nottingham Forest midfielder went on to play for Swindon Town, Sheffield Wednesday and had loan spells at Scunthorpe United and Coventry City, the vast majority of these games in League 1. After retiring Prutton has evolved into a Sky Sports Pundit and YEP columnist.
Prutton was part of the period when our midfield could hardly pass a football (Douglas, Hughes, Johnson etc). If Prutton was honest with himself he would admit his career never recovered from the injury he got in 2005 which added to his long ban in 04-05 for pushing a referee meant his fitness also never looked right and he wasn’t the player in the last 8 seasons of his career he looked in the first 8 (he had 25 England U21 caps!). His status amongst Leeds fans was mainly due to dodgy hairstyles and hints of sarcasm in his media contributions back then.
Fowler to: Adam Smith
Adam Smith, right-back. Imagine the scene, you sign on loan from Spurs on January 31st 2012 for manager Simon Grayson, you watch from the stands as your new team loses 4-1 at home. The next day the manager is gone. You make your debut that week, playing 3 games under caretaker Neil Redfearn. Then Neil Warnock appears and within hours you have gone back to Spurs despite playing well.
That was the lot of Adam Smith at Elland Road. Since leaving Leeds Smith has become a mainstay of the Bournemouth side that will soon be starting its fourth season in the Premier League.
Ubering Up 25/03/18, break is not as good as a rest.
So its international break weekend, but miserbilism never rests. Uber number of little things below.
Trying too hard.
Something I learnt a long time ago is that you can get yourself in more bother saying something than keeping a dignified silence. This is an adage I think particularly football managers should take on board. I can understand to a point why Heckingbottom took advice to do media this week (you could tell from his Radio Leeds appearance it is not a territory he chooses himself willingly), with his Leeds and Barnsley in the Championship record he needs to sell himself a bit. The fact that all he did was confirm he is swimming in waters beyond his breast-stroke capacity was inevitable.
As articulated in earlier missives, Heckingbottom hardly had high key performance indicators to reach between appointment and season end, get a few wins and improve the team, but here we are half way through and he is found wanting on both. If I was him I would focus on the next 4 home games, put media comments on the back burner, stop talking about transfer budgets, wage budgets, contract discussions and instead tell himself “Bolton, Sunderland, Barnsley and QPR are all winnable and I should focus on them”.
It s the curse of modern football that managers need persona’s, however good managers know they need substance on tactics, team selection and coaching or they are pointless. Heckingbottom is struggling on those and unless he stops trying too hard on the media side will pay the price for that. I am working on the assumption not even Leeds at its most cynical (which it is not at this juncture) would organise media for a manager this week whilst considering sacking them before Good Friday. Therefore it is fair to say Heckingbottom will be in place against Bolton. If we perform like we did against Sheffield Wednesday he might not be against Fulham or Sunderland, in which case….
Introducing…:
The man I’d give the last 6/7 games to is… But before I name them lets consider what would make a good caretaker manager (I take the Groucho Marx approach that I don’t want a manager who is available to take us on permanently at this stage of a season)? Well, dignity, a capacity as shown elsewhere to turn adversity around, tactical adaptability that utilises the good bits of the squad regardless of nationality and a sense of authority to put those slackers we have in their place.
Interestingly we have someone at the club who fits that criteria, he is called Carlos Corberan. Yes our U23’s coach, who would have done a great job just keeping them off the bottom of their Development League given what state he inherited Thorp Arch, but having turned things around, blended imports, young British signings and our own products (hey any chance we can credit Orta for some of that? Well you would have to be blinkered not to) and took them to play-off contention is achievement indeed. This option post Heckingbottom also allows for one or two more of the younger players to be blooded before May 6th brings the curtain down on our season.
Corberan is only 34 and yet has already packed in a varied coaching career. You will note I don’t suggest he is a contender for the full job, but equally I don’t say he isn’t. What I do say is the next permanent Leeds United manager needs to be given a show of confidence so his contract needs to be longer than the stingy 18 months to 2 years that is Radrizzani’s tendency. Our owner needs to stop thinking like an Italian football club owner and start looking at what giving good managers time can accrue (PH is not one before someone chirps). Corberan has shown already with the U23’s how to play a medium term strategy and why the likes of Ian Harte are idiots and he might just show in a caretaker manager role that he can do the same with the first team.
Stats that linger long.
Saw a stat on Twitter and it again shows just how short-term some Leeds fans can be. When Christiansen was manager we had a lot of chat about an inability to turn a game around after going behind first. What you were not told in that in home league games (those played in front of the 1000’s of frustrated managers that populate our stands) that inability stretched back to the start of the Cellino era! You remember that infamous Huddersfield Town game on February 1st 2014? Well from then to today we have come behind at home to win once, Reading on April 16th 2016. So that means not just TC but Monk, Rosler, Redfearn, Milanic, Hockerday and McDermott in his last 4 months couldn’t do it and Evans did it once.
The significance of this? Well it adds the general unease that stats are used out of context constantly and again another of the scatter-gun justifications for breaking the continuity on February 4th has been exposed as garbage. Sometimes even I when I read my recent stuff wonder if I have accidentally turned into an acolyte of Andrea (and there is a lot to praise if you have half a brain to see it), but when it comes to the level of contempt I have for his decision to not keep to a medium term plan, it is in the Bates/GFH/Cellino ball-park territory.
Signings too early.
Does it matter we are liked with Barnsley player Yiadom? Is it good or bad that on loan to that team from Swansea forward McBurnie is linked with us? Would it matter if we were linked with all the great Barnsley signings of 17-18 that mean that club manfully teeters on the edge of relegation? It does and it doesn’t. In terms of doesn’t at this stage what is the point speculating given we are not clear who is managing us in 18-19 and thus how much they could assist/influence Orta on possible signings. Even Heckingbottom himself has said other than for 2-3 in’s any other additions are contingent on getting long contracted players out. Frankly any speculation on signings is fruitless till June.
However let us focus on Andy Yiadom a minute. No need to speculate on why he is tipped to be coming to Elland Road, his contract is up at Barnsley in the summer, he is a right-back, he has played under Heckingbottom, he is even an international (Ghana). Equally no need to make judgements on whether we should sign him based on form, some of us take more interest in how other championship clubs are doing than others and you can guarantee opinions on him will be split. What however we should be asking is what would signing on a Bosman a player whose previous clubs are Barnet, Braintree and Hayes+Yeading say about our “model”? Well it would tell me it has been badly compromised and we had gone back to the random signings that populated our squads 2002-17. As the Fowler To contributions on this site show that is a failed policy that gave us 250+ showers of shite. Let us not go there. If Yiadom is good enough, if he fits in with the age, skill-set and future asset approach we have adopted since June 17, good. The best way to prove that would be to retain an interest in him even after Heckingbottom takes his kids on that holiday planned for the week after his departure. However, if he comes under his ex boss the signals will be all wrong.
Those who say they want to trust Heckingbottom on signings should check out the players he signed on in 17-18. If you think Kieffer Moore, Mamadou Thiam or Cameron McGeehan are Championship standard forwards, Harvey Barnes is a good loan signing or Matt Mills would be a good addition to our defence you want your lumps feeling.
Letting Pablo go in peace.
Hernandez is quality, we know that, but is his potential departure on a Bosman the disaster anticipated? Well what perhaps we should do is examine more of those “out of context” stats. Starting with, how have Leeds done this season when both Hernandez and Saiz both start (league games only)? Well, decently actually. They have started a low 14 games together, that brought 7 wins, 4 draws and 3 defeats (extrapolated to 46 games that is 2nd to 5th). Now take that away from our general record and without both of them its P24, W07, D04, L13 (which is 17-19th territory). So in short without them we have the same record as Heckingbottom in the championship, a 50% loss ratio.
Lets drill down, our record without either of them starting is simple, we lost away to Sheffield United. So when we play one of the other alone we are P23, W07, D04, L12. So what we next need to do is compare results when Pablo starts only with results when Samuel starts only? So Pablo, who has started more without Samuel than the other way around, is P14, W03, D04, L07 and Samuel is P09, W04, D00, L05. Picking the bones out of that is a minefield. Pablo’s win rate starting without Samuel is poor. Saiz wins more, games and more points per game without Hernandez that the other way around but non are as effective as them both starting. However, lets look at the both starting together record since after Ipswich at home. Its P06, W02, D02, L02. So in essence once you exclude that early season off to a blinder period their record together is as bad as their record apart.
So what to think? Well for me its a simple equation. If Saiz is staying (i.e. no PL or LaLiga club throw £10m+ at us) we can let Hernandez move on with our thanks knowing no point keeping him when playing them both is not effective and neither is the elder one as a back-up to the younger one. If Saiz is going you can make a case for Pablo staying but it asks a bit much of him to be the only creative midfielder (and the stats say he isn’t that effective on results despite some stunning performance’s). I don’t particularly want to see Pablo slotting balls all over Elland Road in a Birmingham City shirt next season but in terms of where we are as a club I am happy to say “thank you” to him and wish him well in the West Midlands/Spain next season.
The future of English football.
Lewis Cook. No more to be said really. Not sure why Southgate didn’t give him his England debut against the Dutch but it will be an even more interesting sight watching him show his class against the Italians. As for you lot who said we got lucky selling him for a pittance, I believe the technical expression is “do one”.
Here is what you could have won.
Paul Clement (worked at Chelsea, Real Madrid, PSG and Bayern Munich) is Reading manager, he was available in February this year but we employed more local. If we exclude Leeds, Reading, Barnsley and Derby fans from a poll, who do you think other football fans would say had done the better appointment. I can guarantee it won’t be Radrizzani and Leeds and that is a telling statement.
Cheers
MG.
Fowler to: Michael Tonge
Michael Tonge, midfield. Joined on loan from Stoke City in September 2012 which became a full signing in January 2013. Tonge played 58 league games in 3 seasons scoring 4 goals. Tonge was loaned out to Millwall in 14-15 and left Elland Road May 2015 where we went on to sign for Stevenage. Presently with Port Vale.
Tonge is an enigma, a ball-passing footballer who has played under managerial dinosaurs Warnock (Sheffield United and Leeds), Pulis (Stoke City) and Brown (Port Vale). Tonge had the touch but lacked an engine and he clearly wasn’t the player he used to be when he came to Leeds. His biggest contribution, the goal against Sheffield Wednesday will always be associated with the idiocy it provoked.
Fowler to: Mike Grella
Mike Grella, winger (some would say). Grella joined on trail and then permanent in January 2009 from Carolina Railhawks U23’s. Played 29 league games, mostly sub scoring one goal. Leeds loaned him out to Carlisle United and Swindon town before he departed for Brentford in August 2011 after cancelling his contract.
Grella was a worker but was League 2 standard. Since leaving Leeds he has also played for Bury, Scunthrope United, Viborg in Denmark and various USA based clubs. Presently with Columbus Crew. Grella has never been capped by the USA.
Fowler to: Matt Grimes.
Matt Grimes, midfield. Signed on a years loan in July 2016 from Swansea, it was not a success. Grimes appeared in 7 league games, mostly as a sub, scoring 0 goals. From November onward he was hardly seen at all.
Grimes joined Swansea from Exeter and has only played 4 times for the PL club. Before Leeds Grimes had a loan spell at Blackburn Rovers and since returning to Swansea has been loaned out again to Northampton Town in L1. He recently got himself sent off.
Grimes was rubbish at Elland Road, not one of Garry Monk’s smarter moves.
Ubering Up: 18/03/18
Week 2. Uber is as miserablist does. Lots of stuff to catch up with, starting with that pile of crud yesterday.
Wendies all this going to end?
So another loss against local Yorkshire rivals. That leaves Heckingbottom starting down the barrel of a 50% loss rate, which is a replication of the 50% loss rate he as accrued all season in the Championship this season and the close to 50% loss rate from his close to 2 full season’s as a Championship manager. The other consistency with PH is we let in another 2 goals, that is the average in his 8 games and that is well over the TC average even after the Millwall and Cardiff never mind before. And he/you can’t blame the goalkeeper, he put in Peacock-Farrell to play and despite his 7 goals conceded in 3 games the consensus is he has prevented it being an average 3 goals a game conceded (and yet Wiedwald wasn’t conceding anywhere near that level). 6 points from a possible 24 is a bad tally in any situation, its appalling when your task was to reignite a play-off push!
But let us forget stats for a minute and concentrate on what we saw yesterday. We saw a team that tactically lost the game from the moment the starting 11 was announced. 4-5-1 at home against a struggling team for form. A striker as the 1 who whilst a willing helper is not scoring league goals, 2 defensive midfielders who replicate each other with 1 of them almost playing as a 5th defender first half, all the burden on creating chances falling on 1 player (Hernandez who for him was having one of his worst Leeds games but was still the only quality) and the final indignity, our biggest attacking threat being Berardi!
It became very clear early on it was going to be a poor game, that Sheffield Wednesday were depleted and lacking in confidence but still just about the better side. It has been a recurring theme of PH’s teams that they never clearly dominate a game, even true when we scraped that win against Brentford. Despite debutant Pearce being our best player second half we lacked any fresh ideas. At one point before Wednesday got the opener I contemplated the prospect of neither sides manager being in place in August, despite both being relativity recent appointments, due to the turgid and rigid nature of the play, at least Luhukay could point to his second win as Wednesday manager at full time.
Heckingbottom must be the only person on the planet who thinks a Forshaw-O’Kane pairing is a good thing. He has used it 4 times now and not one win has accrued (and that Forshaw stat goes on, despite his best crab like efforts its 9 games no wins)? I have seen Phillips and Vieira, a young combo, do better in those positions this season and yet both were on the bench. When we went to 3-5-2 we looked ok (Berardi is ok in that position) but at 1-1 it screamed 4-4-2 for us to either try to win it or at least keep a point, well you saw what happened.
Heckingbottom was asked to steady the ship and plot a recover a path to play-off contention. Instead we are 8 games into a defence getting worse, a midfield getting less adventurous and an attack that has lost its way completely. Now you can make as any calls for patience as you like and list a litany of excuses but in reality the record is now PH’s and if the style and outcomes remains the same against Bolton on the 30th March then for me someone else needs to be picking the team against Fulham (who that should be I will relate next week). Radrizzani has already indicated results will over-ride personal sentiment when it comes to Heckingbottom, in truth he is already letting his feeling about the coach in PH (I am sure there is a decent non team picking player development coach in their) stop him doing what is inevitable now, accepting he made a mistake in February by employing Heckingbootom and he should end this as soon as he can.
Protesteth too much.
Is Radrizzani playing a smart game over the Wolves approach? Well yes and no. The initial rants looked far too raw to be part of a smart PR exercise and whilst most media attention and social media tittle-tattle focused on his “if its legal I might want to do it” comments the real issue is elsewhere.
Radrizzani had a stake in a players agency before he fully bought Leeds United. he sold his stake in that and that seems to be the cause of his irk. Someone, and I can guess who (like I can guess who was the real blindsided idiot on the badge debacle) has given Andrea either wrong or confused football governance advice. When he rants on about copying Wolves he means having his club cake and eating it with his agency fork, he does not mean copy the model 100%. Sometimes the simple rational is the one that explains the best why something happened. In this case its an owner who knows he is much more comfortable in business than football reacting to leaning he didn’t have to give an old business up.
If there is a lesson to be learnt from the last 3 seasons of promotion from the Championship it is that the Burnley, Bournemouth, Newcastle, Brighton, Huddersfield, Hull, Middlesbrough, Watford or Norwich models have little in common with each other. The same applies to the contenders this season of Wolves, Fulham, Villa, Cardiff, Derby etc., not one of them is aping a previous style. As witness by the demise of Hull, Norwich and Middlesbrough from the PL since promotion, some models are more successful than others in sustaining. Leeds will go up with its own model, assuming that model has non of the daft ideas the three owners before Radrizzani had. The reality is the future of this club, and its model was set out in Summer 17 and as I stated last week the time to make (mostly knee-jerk) reactions about whether the model is effective or can work, that time is the end of season 19-20.
Grot a bright future.
Did you see the highlights of the U23’s verses Hull City? If you did you will have seen Jay-Roy Grot showing that when he is allowed to perform without the pressure of wondering if he is going to get abuse that no 19-year-old without a league start yet should suffer. Well blow me down if Jay-Roy didn’t go and score yesterday after coming off the bench. Was not the greatest of goals but it did the job for him, the team and us. He now as a league goal that he deserves for taking the needless flak on the chin.
Feel free to remind me of this if you want in the future but I am so looking forward to Grot being a real goal asset next season. All he needs is a set position, front man or winger, I know which I think it is, a striker in a 2 or 3 up front.
Prisoner of the past.
Ah Robert Bayley, from head-butting on his full debut to jailed in Ireland for drug courier activity. Always sad to see a once promising player get it wrong in real life. The club have signed a lot of young players recently and with both Peacock-Farrell and Pearce making first team debuts our academy looks good. I like Carlos Corberan, he seems an understated type who just got on with improving the system (or mess as we should say) left behind after Cellino and after a predictable iffy results period has turned the U23’s around nicely. I also get the impression the pastoral side of what we do at Thorp Arch is better and that, in the context of the news about Bayly, can only be a good thing.
Normality is a spit away.
Carragher, strange bloke, but then we saw some of that in his playing career, particularly when lobbing coins into crowds with force. But the real issue from his disgusting behaviour last weekend is not who he works for or whether its legal to film from a moving car, no the issue is one of a society populated by idiots. The idea that “two-one” constitutes goading is just not worth giving credibility to, frankly the father of the 14-year-old spat at could have called him a scouse c**t and the response would still have been sack-able. Just to remind, this hit a 14 year old girl.
But the worst thing is this: the father has received death threats. Now notwithstanding the mentality required to do that what always gets me in situations like this is how the person at fault can utilise the full range of public relations skills to try and rescue his reputation but the normal human being, with a 14-year-old daughter having been spat on, gets nothing but being a magnet for unthinking abuse. This reminds me of the Clarke Carlisle, lorry driver on the A64 situation, lot of media/PR love for the ex footballer but bugger all for the traumatised normal guy just legally going about his daily business. Regrets from persons with PR machines behind them should be taken for what they are, coordinated attempts to save careers. If only because of the pain and distress normal human beings are put through by cases like this the likes of Carragher need to become the next Keys/Gray and leave the country to pontificate on football. Let’s be realistic, nothing that comes out of Carragher’s mouth about footballers and particularly standards of behaviour, whether words or phlegm, will ever again carry an ounce of credibility.
LFU.
Leeds Fans United have an AGM next week. Personally I never signed up due to the democracy being so blatantly pseudo. So a question for those who paid in? Did you all really sign up to your money being held in perpetuity and denied back to you even if you wanted it back and nothing had been done with it after over 3 years? Oh well, that is very magnanimous of you if you did.
The leadership of LFU know, because as Trust Chair and board member 2014-17 I told them this, that in medium term the inevitability is 1 supporters organisation, with real democracy, where supporters ownership rather than fan ownership is the key. After recent issues and Twitter spats between persons and the organisations that doesn’t look like happening soon but, and the Trust needs to face this too, it is the logical outcome (like it was for Huddersfield Town groups a few years ago) of the last few years.
LFU need to find somewhere to use the pot, if it turns out to be buying a small slice of a bit-part of the club, so be it. The ambitious dream of a meaningful stake with board representation at the club is dead and that is the reality that those who do have a right to shape LFU’s direction going forward should at least acknowledge next week.
Cheers
MG
Fowler to: Paul Green.
Paul Green, midfield. Pontefract born Green was signed in July 2012 by Warnock from Derby County on a Bosman. He played 41 league games scoring 4 goals. After a loan spell out at Ipswich Town Green left for Rotherham United in June 2014 after his contract was cancelled in May 2014. Presently with Crewe Alexandra on loan from Oldham Athletic. Green has 22 Republic of Ireland caps.
What motivated Green to join Leeds, other than being a local lad, only he knows. He seemed to be a player with a decent touch who was happy to let defenders hoof the ball over his head constantly. Any of Warnock’s signings were always destined to disappoint but Green is a particular example of a player from that horrid period who was lesser in a Leeds shirt than his previous reputation at Doncaster Rovers and Derby County suggested.
Fowler to: Ramon Nunez.
Ramon Nunez, attacking midfield. Nunez, an Honduran international, was signed in August 2010 from Olimpia on a free. Nunez played 21 league games, scoring 1 goal (and a couple in the League Cup against Bradford City) which was not a lot of games for a player who stayed till January 2013 and at one stage had a 5 year contract. Was loaned to Scunthorpe United.
Nunez was one of those players that could look dynamic at times but was never given the opportunity in terms of consecutive games to show it. Warnock in particular refused to play him. Since leaving Leeds Nunez played in Costa Rica, Hondurus, the MLS, and other United States leagues. Last seen at Fort Lauderdale Strikers (who went bust in 2017).
mglufc twitter extension 