Promotion was always going to be a tall order after losing so many players last Summer. Farke did incredibly well to assemble the team he did, but we were always going to have to strengthen in January, just like Southampton and Ipswich did! Keifer Moore (and Al Hamadi) made the difference for Ipswich whilst similarly David Brooks and versatile midfielder Joe Rothwell added fresh legs for the Saints, when they needed it most. As a club, Leeds don't learn by their mistakes. Last season, they failed to prepare for the Championship, and this campaign, after getting themselves into a fantastic position, didn't finish the job, deciding instead to gamble with the same 15 players, hoping they would have enough impetus to crawl over the finishing line.
No point playing gray and gnonto when you have experience in roberts and james. Why have fast wingers when you play a snail up front. Two midfielders who cannot pass forward and Southampton were not much better.
On a side note was anyone else disappointed in a lack of atmosphere in that second half when we needed it
Neutral opinion: I think there were a few players hiding today in your team. And even Archie gray showed his inexperience - refused to really take on his man. (I also have been saying that some of your players play more for themselves rather than the club) Southampton usually play possession based football, so to see them set up to counter, score, and successfully defend for 80ish minutes was a huge surprise. (And a bit damning on Farke) Playoff finals are always the toughest losses because it feels like the only game where if you lose, it’s harder to think about “going again next season” due to the inevitable player sales and financial situation. Hope you can come again next season. The 3 teams going down are absolute ****, so you should be up there.
Nonsense, how many consecutive wins did we have at the turn of the year. It was nothing to do with strengthening. We had the likes of Anthony, Gnonto and Piroe on the bench, Moore wouldn’t have managed a start for us. It was down to Farke relying on individual talent for a few games too many. We didn’t play enough as a team, Ipswich did and pipped us The top 4 teams this year were head and shoulders ahead of everyone else, we did the double over the top two, we’re not PL quality I agree but I assure you nobody in this division is this season. Ipswich had two quality individuals who carried them over the line and an outstanding coach. All three are going back to their parent clubs.
For the third play off final in a row we've had more shots than the opposition yet lost all 3 games with an aggregate score of 5-0. We were also favorites for each game.
Utter bollox pal i) Moore was Ipswich's best player by a mile! ii) Southampton made the most of the loan system Mason Hollgate - replaced in Jan by Joe Rothwell Taylor Harwood-Bellis David Brooks Ryan Fraser Who did we have besides Joe Rodon (who has spent the last 2 months of pain killing injections so he can play? He and Ampadu had to play every minute of every game as we didn't use our loan system, and the players became weeker, slower and more lathargic. Jaidon Anthony - what a **** loan signing - its not like to needed another winger and Connor Roberts (243 mins of game time). Going into our last 8 games, the tank was on empty and the players were running on fumes.
Despite the negativity we were slightly the better team today and one moment of crazy defending cost us. My gripe is how we caught the top two and then folded, Dan James shot just, a cm or two lower and it would have been 1-1 and momentum on our side. Fine margins today but our failure isn’t about today, it’s about failing on the run in
We don't need wingers, and I'm not actually sure what category you'd put Piroe in. We needed another central defender, another midfielder and a striker
Are all those players who are out on loan like Harrison, Sinisterra, Wöber, Koch, Llorente, Kristensen, Roca, Aaronson etc. being sold or are they coming back? I understand they all have clauses in their contracts allowing them to go out on loan if you aren’t in the Premier League. That is a massive ****-up by Leeds as it means you can’t claw back tens of millions in transfer fees that you otherwise would’ve done. If you don’t get promoted, those players can just go out on loan until their contracts expire can’t they? What an absolute waste of money.
1) Running on fumes - Norwich result 2) Ipswich best player Hutchinson 3) Moore was signed as they never had a striker, he would not have made it into our starting 11 4) If our loans were poor blame Farke 5) Utter Bollox - So we didn’t win 9 consecutive games at the start of the year and close a 10 point gap
This appraisal doesn’t bear scrutiny does it? Leeds made up points from a huge gap earlier in the season. I think the difference was just that Farke lost his cool. He should have been rallying the troops against QPR but instead he just sat down in the dugout. It was very odd.