****The Official Lapps Match Thread v Leeds (PL/A) *****

[Greavsy 2,412]

1 minute ago, keelansgrandad said:

Its nice that we can still laugh despite all our angst.

I haven't made my mind up if I love you or not. 💋

Agreed. All in it together. 

Thats ok - im here for the long haul - in more ways that one! 

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

13 minutes ago, hogesar said:

I think he survives because he's better in the air than our other midfielders and has a good workrate. I didnt see any other midfielder busting a gut to get in the box for our goal today, for example.

I like Rupp and thought he might replace Kenny but he came in today and was the worst on the pitch for 45 mins 

I get that Kenny is the most likely to score as he does get into the box. But midfield is what sorts out the winners from the losers and why we won two Championships.

But Kenny has had more chances or redemption than Rupp or PLM.  And course he will get stick from us when he is not performing. And today, he was no worse than any other midfield player but he of all  of them has the experience to do better. He was the piece of last season's midfield jigsaw. But this season, without the others, he just isn't good enough.

 

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

3 minutes ago, Greavsy said:

Agreed. All in it together. 

Thats ok - im here for the long haul - in more ways that one! 

Did you get my Valentines Day card by the way?

[Greavsy 2,412]

5 minutes ago, keelansgrandad said:

Did you get my Valentines Day card by the way?

I did wonder if it was from you - with the South West postcode. 

I think the beer voucher had fallen out - but the Selfie (and erm special attire) was appreciated!  (fortunately nothing had fallen out there!) 

Edited March 13, 2022 by Greavsy

[dylanisabaddog 4,866]

19 minutes ago, Jim Smith said:

I know we are not good enough and it’s beyond my comprehension we found a way to lose that having equalised like that but it cannot be overestimated how much the officials influenced that game.

3 yellows not given first ten minutes.

Penalty to us not given before they scored.

offside goal allowed for them.

red card not given for Ayling tackle.

penalty overturned dubiously.

another red not given for Harrison stamp on Max.

Can’t ever recall a worse set of officials. 

Probably the worst refereing performance I've ever seen. In fact I can't quite believe what I've just seen. He may as well have just bent over and let Elland Road do it's worst. I shouldn't have to say it but our players must take some of the blame. They just tolerated it. They've got to learn to put more pressure on referees. 

It's not an easy job with 40,000 people screaming at you but FFS. That was just ridiculous. 

[hogesar 9,615]

2 minutes ago, dylanisabaddog said:

Probably the worst refereing performance I've ever seen. In fact I can't quite believe what I've just seen. He may as well have just bent over and let Elland Road do it's worst. I shouldn't have to say it but our players must take some of the blame. They just tolerated it. They've got to learn to put more pressure on referees. 

It's not an easy job with 40,000 people screaming at you but FFS. That was just ridiculous. 

It was beyond dreadful officiating from those on the pitch and the usual corrupt VAR officials desperate to ensure Leeds get another season in the big league.

It all seems so unnecessary too, we do a pretty good job of losing without awful officiating.

[Greavsy 2,412]

4 minutes ago, hogesar said:

It was beyond dreadful officiating from those on the pitch and the usual corrupt VAR officials desperate to ensure Leeds get another season in the big league.

It all seems so unnecessary too, we do a pretty good job of losing without awful officiating.

I watched the rugby yesterday and noticed in comms they said their video referee is in a truck in the car park.

Shame they cant do that for EPL as they are probably worried the fans will lynch them for a dodgy decision.

[canarybubbles 1,915]

4 minutes ago, Greavsy said:

I watched the rugby yesterday and noticed in comms they said their video referee is in a truck in the car park.

Shame they cant do that for EPL as they are probably worried the fans will lynch them for a dodgy decision.

The Wizard of Oz behind his curtain. Says everything about the attitude of the football authorities towards the fans, doesn't it?

[Greavsy 2,412]

5 minutes ago, canarybubbles said:

The Wizard of Oz behind his curtain. Says everything about the attitude of the football authorities towards the fans, doesn't it?

I took it as more the attitude of the fans towards the officials. 

They are allowed drinks in the stands at rugby too. 

[sgncfc 1,221]

The whole set up of elite level football is based on generating as much money as possible. World Cups to Qatar and the US. 32 teams in the Euro's. Whether conscious or unconscious that includes appalling referees, whether they are on the pitch or watching a screen 200 miles away. 

If your team isn't in the top league it has to be striving to get there because that's where the money is.

It's no longer about entertainment or being part of something - if it was, we would never have sacked Farke. Delia can go on and on about her club being different but when push came to shove, she lost the manager who had a heart and a plan and backed the bloke who doesn't. 

It's never going to change.

Time for a breakaway league, with salary caps and ownership rules. Now, if I was a billionaire......

 

[DraytonBoy 142]

Bizarre refereeing and VAR decisions alter games and today was a prime example, will it change relegation for City probably not but that result could be the difference between Leeds surviving or not.

 

 

[......and Smith must score. 1,332]

27 minutes ago, DraytonBoy said:

Bizarre refereeing and VAR decisions alter games and today was a prime example, will it change relegation for City probably not but that result could be the difference between Leeds surviving or not.

 

 

I think we were f*cked whatever the result today but it would have made your boys sweat a bit 

[East Rider 548]

1 hour ago, Jim Smith said:

I know we are not good enough and it’s beyond my comprehension we found a way to lose that having equalised like that but it cannot be overestimated how much the officials influenced that game.

3 yellows not given first ten minutes.

Penalty to us not given before they scored.

offside goal allowed for them.

red card not given for Ayling tackle.

penalty overturned dubiously.

another red not given for Harrison stamp on Max.

Can’t ever recall a worse set of officials. 

Other than the penalty that the officials had enough margin to overturn, everyone of those points you mention I 100% agree with. 

I can understand the pressure from the crowd but it's small things such as the lineo instantly putting his flag up as soon as it looks remotely like an offside against us, yet is happy to let their first goal stand, despite the FACT that the offside player influenced ply by drawing in Gibson who would have otherwise been available to challenge for the final ball

[ricardo 7,339]

1 hour ago, dylanisabaddog said:

Probably the worst refereing performance I've ever seen. In fact I can't quite believe what I've just seen. He may as well have just bent over and let Elland Road do it's worst. I shouldn't have to say it but our players must take some of the blame. They just tolerated it. They've got to learn to put more pressure on referees. 

It's not an easy job with 40,000 people screaming at you but FFS. That was just ridiculous. 

Its not bad luck, VAR or bent refs that has got us relegated. Scoring less than a goal a game and conceding more than two, will always condemn you to the drop. Clear and obvious before Xmas, the rest has just been wishful thinking.

[Highland Canary 76]

We lack quality. Equally, that one was difficult to take at Elland Road. A grim way to lose. We can only hope for new investment if the objective is to win football matches.

[chicken 2,604]

4 hours ago, Monty13 said:

Whatever happened with Cantwell is at least partly the fault of the leadership team at the club, can’t ignore that.

Rashica isn’t even close to a direct replacement for Buendia though. I think he’s a great asset and one of the few who looks the part this season. However Buendia was a creative midfielder and Rashica is a direct, pacy winger. He’s not what we needed to get the best out of Pukki.

I agree finding a Tettey replacement should have been easy. We just needed that one enforcer as an option and we didn’t get it.

Overall any post mortem of our summer is pretty damning, hard to spin it otherwise.

Honestly? I think we had too much to do with too little funds again.

If you look at the sides that succeed in staying up, they do a lot of their signing the summer before promotion or they have an established side with an established approach.

Sadly, we faced too much change, then Farke threw out his principles and changed style... when he had built a side with that approach as their focus. It didn't really work for ten games, then we bring in a manager who, on this seasons evidence, isn't remotely similar. And we wondered why Buendia wasn't producing before he left Villa?

It's a bit of a mess to sort out in some ways, in others, the only standout players that would remotely look to leave in the summer to stay in the prem are the likes of Aarons and Rashica. I can't see anyone else attracting much interest.

[Monty13 2,229]

50 minutes ago, chicken said:

Honestly? I think we had too much to do with too little funds again.

If you look at the sides that succeed in staying up, they do a lot of their signing the summer before promotion or they have an established side with an established approach.

Sadly, we faced too much change, then Farke threw out his principles and changed style... when he had built a side with that approach as their focus. It didn't really work for ten games, then we bring in a manager who, on this seasons evidence, isn't remotely similar. And we wondered why Buendia wasn't producing before he left Villa?

It's a bit of a mess to sort out in some ways, in others, the only standout players that would remotely look to leave in the summer to stay in the prem are the likes of Aarons and Rashica. I can't see anyone else attracting much interest.

I’d disagree slightly, I think we tried to do to much with too little funds, I’m not convinced we had to.

[Crafty Canary 495]

Just seen the highlights (?) on MOTD. Although by the current laws their first goal should stand the laws don’t take into account that Bamford’s position required the CBs to react and was thus interfering with play, As for their second goal Gibson should be ashamed of his pathetic effort to allow a player half a foot shorter than him to win a headed challenge. We truly are utter sh1te.

[SwindonCanary 455]

The question I'm asking is why did we leave only 3 players back for that second goal ?

[chicken 2,604]

On 13/03/2022 at 21:30, Monty13 said:

I’d disagree slightly, I think we tried to do to much with too little funds, I’m not convinced we had to.

I have broken this down before I think but the list of players we let go, loaned out or sold etc:

Returned to parent club from loan: Skipp
Sold/released: Buendia(wanted to leave), Stiepermann(wanted to leave), Vrancic, Trybull, Leitner, Heise, Thompson, Sitti, Klose, Tettey, Nyland. 
Loaned out: Hernandez, Sinani, J. Martin, Soto, Drmic, McCallum, Famewo, Hugill, then Bushiri and Mumba in January.

Of those we lost last summer, both Skipp and Buendia were fully out of our control. Some want to debate the latter and seem to think in this day and age that if you refuse to sell a player they'll somehow not down tools and play as well as before. Just ask Arsenal fans how that went with Abameyang.

Beyond those two, Stiepermann, who I feel was a lot more influential than given credit for, wanted to return to Germany after a horrendous year suffering with covid and then the long term implications of it including an illness believed to have been caused by it and being far away from his family. Who can forgive him for wanting to go home to ensure future isolations were closer to his family?

Nyland is a bit of a debatable one, though I think it's clear he wanted to go somewhere to be first choice and he had no chance of doing that with Krul in front of him. Again, not hugely ripped up trees for Bournemouth either.

Trybull and Leitner may have some quality, but neither had played much of a part for the club since relegation, Trybull spent a season on loan at Blackburn and Leitner - is anyone's guess. Neither seem to be pulling up trees since they have moved on. Trybull may have given us a little more steel, and I always liked the calm hatchet jobs he did when he was playing. I don't feel either of those would get into this team. Was Leitner that different to say, Gilmore, last time we were in the Premier League? Many fans suggested he was too lightweight and if his passing wasn't on point, he struggled to make an impact.

Klose and Tettey fall into the end of their careers bracket. Tettey has already retired, so as much as we miss his combative and energetic displays, keeping him clearly wasn't much of an option and I feel we squeezed as much out of him as possible, and I am glad we did. We miss him hugely, but it is doubtful he would have made a difference this season.

Sitti, Heise and Thompson get thrown into the never really made it with us pile. Thompson is agonizing as it is clear that before injuries he had real potential. Not much more to say on that, none of those would have impacted this season, they didn't whilst in the championship.

At this point, we come to Vrancic. Of the list of players above, he is one of the only ones that I believe could bring something to the squad. That said, I still don't think he'd be playing regularly, or would have saved much money. If you did subscribe to the idea that he improves our midfield, which player would we not have signed to keep him? Baring in mind at that point we had McLean, Sorensen and Rupp as the midfielders left at the club.

We brought in Normann, Gilmore on loan and Lees-Melou for £3.5m. I suspect most folks would say Gilmore at this point. Which would save us a loan slot. Though that begs the question of whether we could afford the wages to bring another loan in if we kept Vrancic. We can imagine we could, it's then about what position you would look to bring in another loan in.

Right, loans. Lets just get Soto, Famewo, Bushiri and Sinani out of the way first. None played for us in the championship season, so we didn't have enough information then to suggest any were good enough for the squad in the premier league. On top of that, we now have some hindsight which suggests Sinani is adapting to the English game nicely, Soto appears to have failed in his first loan of the season having been switched to Livingstone for the second half of the season (that seems to have gone under the radar a bit). Essentially none have shown yet that they could have made an impact this season.

That leaves Hernandez, Hugill, Drmic, McCallum, Mumba and J.Martin. McCallum is certainly getting good reviews in the championship - probably well worth the reason to loan him out IMHO. Again, had we have kept him, then it's unlikely Williams comes in and we then don't have one of our more consistent players for this season. Is he ready to step up to the prem? Same with J.Martin - arguably people will say he would have been a better option than Tzolis on current form, but then Martin has also struggled to make an impact at two league one clubs...

We can probably cut to the chase to be honest. The only ones that can seriously be debated here are Hugill and Hernandez, though some still harbour ideas that Drmic could have come good if given that season in the Championship. He wasn't, need to move on.

So that's it. Of all the players we let go, realistically, as in players we could have kept by offering new contracts or not sending out on loan are Vrancic, Hernandez and Hugill. I've considered Vrancic. So lets start with Hugill - do we really think he is a premier league striker? Do we think he'd do better than Idah? Or at a push Sargent? Sure, there is the argument that he is good for the dressing room - but if that is the main consideration we'd still have Iwan Roberts, Grant Holt and Paul Crichton on the books and sitting in there... we'd probably also need a bigger dressing room.

Would he help our current situation without Idah? Sure, yes. Because anything is better than nothing. I'm not sure how it would drastically improve us though. Not enough to be winning games I don't feel. For the squad, for depth, then yes ok. Does he save us a signing - no, not really. Sargent was the signing that could play up front or on the wing so I doubt we would have not signed him, especially as we wanted strength and pace, which he has and Hugill only has one of. If anything, I think had we kept Hugill, Idah would likely have been off on loan. Iffy, I can see the pro's and con's, I just don't see how Hugill would drastically alter the course of this season.

Hernandez. I'll be honest here. Genuinely the only player I think we could have kept in the squad that would have made a real difference. I say that because with Hugill there is the talk of the dressing room, we know Argos is loved by all and has immense energy and positivity - much like Tettey in that sense. Like others, I also put him above Placheta in our squad, though we know Placheta was to be loaned out too only for covid to prevent it. If being really honest, I feel he is also a better wide player, at least traditional wide player than Dowell. I was a bit gutted when he wasn't brought back for the remainder of the season. We know his end product is erratic, but he is quick, strong and gets stuck in. His unpredictability can also cause teams problems which is probably why he was by far one of the best performers for us in the run of games in project restart, pretty much the only run of games he got that season having been out with injury.

Being generous, say we kept Vrancic, Hugill and Hernandez. Lets imagine that frees up Gilmore's loan spot and we don't sign Tzolis for £8.8m. That's essentially what we're looking at isn't it. Another £8.8m. Unless we found cheaper cover for Krul, and not a long term successor in Gunn, in which case you are looking at another £2.5-5m.

Then I guess people will point at spending more on the likes of PLM's position and going for a much more defensively minded player. Possibly not signing Sargent and spending more on him, perhaps finding a better striker? (though we did try with Armstrong).

Long and short of it is I don't think realistically there is a way of keeping more than the three players mentioned and still strengthening our squad. Lets say we saved £10m in not signing a couple of players we did sign in Tzolis and Gunn. We'd be adding £5m onto Sargent and PLM's fee? So £13m and £8.5m... I do think we could find a half decent DM for £8.5m. A better striker? Armstrong went for £15-20m.

It's certainly not an easy argument to prove and requires a lot of hindsight - Vrancic's early season form especially inspires the "we should have held onto him" argument.

On the whole though, I agree with @Bethnal Yellow and Green if you look at teams that successfully stay up in good detail, they don't tend to go for wholesale change to their matchday squad OR their footballing philosophy. What cost us was not signing genuine 'inbetweenies' the summer we were relegated. The championship is more forgiving and appears to have been a much better learning space for the likes of Buendia, Cantwell, Hernandez, Pukki and more than throwing players in at the deep end in the premier league has proven to be.

Only saving grace is I honestly can't see a lot of these players going elsewhere come the end of the season unless it's decided that we'll push through another revolution and transition.