The #LUFC Breakfast Debate (Monday 22nd January)

Good Morning. It's Monday 22nd January, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road

Piroe's stoppage time winner lifts roof off ER

Joel Piroe's stoppage time spot kick winner, lifted the roof off Elland Road, as Leeds came from behind and avenged the wrongs of Boxing Day.

Not four weeks, Liam Millar's late strike had knocked the stuffing out of ten man Leeds. Their antics had led to Meslier's earlier dismissal, and the Lilywhites took full advantage.

Their shenanigans had a detrimental effect on proceedings this time around too; whether they were kicking lumps out of the Leeds players, or slowing the game down to levels only usually associated with Ketamine - it was painful to watch.

Along with the JFK assassination and disappearance of Lord Lucan, conspiracy theorists will looks on Sundays events, asking themselves how Preston escaped with only six yellow cards?

Will Keane had put Preston ahead on two minutes after Millar's mishit effort fell nicely for the former Manchester Utd apprentice. When Dan James restored order three minutes later, heading home Junior Firpo's peach of a cross, many envisaged a goal fest, similar to the ten goal thriller these two sides had put on nearly fourteen years ago, but alas - it was not meant to be.

Just as we thought the game was heading for stalemate, Ryan Ledson handled in the area, leaving the referee little option but to point to the spot. Ironically, the biggest cheers from the crowd was not when Piroe converted, but when Bamford handed him the ball - not that I'm suggesting the ER faithful are fickle!

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Lowe felt robbed by penalty decision

Speaking after the game, Preston Manager Ryan Lowe slated referee David Webb, stating his decisions all game had baffled him, and the penalty decision had robbed his players of a point!

"Gutted is an understatement. I'm gutted for the boys because I thought they were terrific in everything they did. I don't think anybody expected us to come here and go toe-to-toe with them.

"The decisions from the referee baffled me all game. To be done by a penalty decision when the ball hit his body and then rolled up and hit his arm in a natural position... it's tough to take but that's football.

"I said to the lads to be proud. We've got to use this as a motivation for next weekend to continue. "We knew we had to be fast out of the traps and get the ball in behind. I thought it was a great game and a fair result would have been 1-1."

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Farke interested in Godfrey reunion

Reports from Italy suggest Leeds are one of a number of clubs interested in Ben Godfrey.

The 26yo worked under Daniel Farke at Norwich before joining the Toffee's in a £25m deal in 2020. He has slipped down the pecking order since fracturing his fibula early on last season. The arrival of James Tarkowski has restricted the centre back to just 91 minutes of game time this season.

AC Milan and Sheffield Utd have also shown an interest in the former York City apprentice, though his association with Farke may give Leeds the edge!

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Downing joins coaching team

Former Liverpool and England star Stewart Downing has joined the coaching team at Thorp Arch.

Downing will work as deputy for Scott Gardner whose position as first team coach with the U21's has just been made permanent. The 39yo will work alongside fellow coaches Michal Pudjak and Chris Elliott. He retired from professional football in 2021, and has been working with the Middlesbrough academy players since 2022.

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Ben Godfrey mentioned in the summer but the feeling was he wasn’t better than Cresswell? Everton overpaid £20m for him and it looked to be a bargain back in 20/21 when he played 31 times for Everton. The following season only 23 games and then that slipped to only 13 games last season and only 2 so far this season. Injuries? Or just not good enough.

 

Morning all.

Great win yesterday so going to enjoy watching Leicester & Ipswich battle it out tonight and hope for a Leicester win, or at worst a draw.

Also delighted that even though it wasn't the best of games Eire finally got to see us take the 3 points at ER and hopefully they all now have a safe trip back to the West of Ireland

 

Joe Rodon has been a great loan signing for FARKE strong, brave, commited and can play out from the back. Phil Hay says he could be good enough for the Prem. Spurs are going to raise his price to between £15m and £20m according to plenty of stories. Let’s be frank here he is not a £20m or he would be playing for Spurs instead of being loaned out every season. He’s not deemed to be as good as Ben Davies at Spurs who is now also surplus to requirements. If the price for Rodon is £15m that must surely mean Charlie Cresswell is worth at least £10m. Hope our negotiating skills are better now

 

Rodon is probably worth £20M to a lower PL team like a Bournemouth or Forest and definitely the likes of Sheff Utd, Luton & Burnley should one of them miraculously stay up.. Also the Ben Davies thing is not a like for like comparision as they play opposite sides with Rodon strong at passing out with his right foot and Davies the same on his left.

 

Morning all. Another cracking weekend draws towards a close. I won’t forget that penalty for a long time. A couple of city centre bar owners will be pleasantly pleased when they go
To the bank this morning either
Weekend cash lodgement. Our boat will be sailing seemingly so all good

 

Morning everyone I have no idea what time I got in last night. I left the Irish guys and chesh and found a vacant taxi. Ended up at brother OLOF's pub full of beer.

 

Thought Piroe looked sharp yesterday when he came on so maybe the little break from the team has done him good. Although we always seem to sign players who can only shoot with their natural foot because he turned down a really good opportunity from the edge of the box when the whole stadium was urging him to let fly.

Also credit to Farke for going all out for the win by taking Kamara off for Piroe. There's been some criticism of Farke's subs this season but he got it right yesterday so fair play to the fella

 

Morning all

I’m going to enjoy tonight’s game, obviously hoping for a Leicester win but should they lose its back to back defeats and star players missing, they surely can’t drop into the mix can they

 

Jamster you really got to start using logic and not jammy coloured spectacles mate. Agreed there is no comparison between Davies and Rodon. My argument was that Rodon isn’t worth £20m and yet Davies is. Rodon has been on the pitch for Spurs 15 times but sent out on loan after 2 years with no progress and went to France where Rennes had an option to buy but refused to buy him. We then got him on loan. Davies however has played over 200 times for Spurs so a proper PL CB. Are they both worth £20m? Burnley by the way are buying a young French CB as they wont pay English prices

 

After tonight Ipswich have some fixtures that will probably define how the rest of their season goes.

Leicester (a)
Preston (a)
WBA (h)
Millwall (a)
Swansea (a)

To be fair though they've been good away from home.

Oh and no one is forgetting about Southampton but we have to catch one of them first and Ipswich look the most likely.

 

One issue I have with subs. We brought two or three on in last minute. That helped add another two minutes to the added time. Is it a pointless and potentially dangerous exercise that late

 

Time will tell Doc but what I'm seeing is players moving to lower end PL clubs for around that sort of money. Bournemouth for example signed three £20M+ midfielders last summer and god know how much Forest have spent in the last couple of season on average to good players.

 

I had a feeling that’s where you’d end up alright. You were struggling a bit with the various accents

 

Fair point but bringing Cooper on was to redress the balance after having 5 attackers on when going for the game. The one after that I'd agree it's potentially more disruptive rather than being of any clear benefit and in fact Joseph gave away a stupid free kick which meant one last lumped in ball to defend.

 

Yes just when I got tuned in another came along.

 

Sadly we’re not all fluent in Yorkish but we’ll eventually get there

 

Earlier it was said that Newcastle would have to sell before buying due to FFFP rules. Feel sorry for them as they have loads of cash but because City Arsenal Chelsea Liverpool have already cooked the books before that started enforcing it properly Newcastle will not catch up them.

I do however think they are on the verge of putting the fix in. Almeiron looks like going to Saudi and I reckon he ain’t worth more than £15/20m watch how much they sell him for.

 

I'm no Doctor but I would imagine the broken leg was quite restrictive

 

This where the Saudi influence will take over. English based Saudi's selling to Saudi based clubs to make their business work and fix loop holes for their clubs. If Newcastle cant buy there owner will flog players to Saudi for inflated prices to make them a transfer kitty as money there doesn't matter its like paper in the wind and they probably all in it together anyway.