I would have kept Bielsa until the end of the season. From a practical point of view, in that I believe no-one else will get more out of these players, that we will be better for the return of players of the importance of Bamford, Phillips and Cooper, and that there are at least 3 teams I consider to be worse than us. From a romantic point of view, Bielsa deserved to ride off into the sunset on his own terms, and that football today lost a little bit of its soul in prioritising prospective results over the enjoyment and entertainment that a one-off like Marcelo has brought to the Premiership. Non-Leeds fans I've been in touch with today, many of whom have no love for our club, are also lamenting the fact that (almost certainly) his brand of football will not be seen on these shores again, having been royally entertained by LUFC for the last three and a half years, win, lose or draw. As a parallel, almost 5 years ago to the day another Premiership manager just outside the relegation zone, who'd only won 5 games, also got the boot. He was just about to take his team into the 1/4 finals of the Champions League, and might have thought he'd got a bit of credit in the bank, having won the Premiership 9 months earlier at odds of 5000-1. If Leicester could sack Claudio Ranieri at that point, then no-one is unsackable. The reasons for the two sackings are the same - Premiership club owners will do whatever they think it takes to maintain their status if they think it is threatened, because whether we like it or not, they want to protect their investment in this multi-million pound business. This season, having been deprived of live sport for the best part of 18 months, I've hopped on a train for half an hour every other Saturday to watch Dulwich Hamlet in what is the 6th tier of English football.I recognise it will never give me the same buzz I get when watching Leeds (I was at the Olympic Stadium only last month for our awesome win - and performance - over West Ham) but that's not why I go - watching Marcelo's Leeds team has clarified for me that caring about who wins is important but not fundamental to my appreciation of football as a game, a sport and a contest. To deliberately misquote Gary Neville (I must be mellowing if he doesn't rattle my cage so much these days...) "Where do you want your statue, Marcelo Bielsa?" _______________________________________________ Leedslist mailing list Info and options: https://mailman.gn.apc.org/mailman/listinfo/leedslist To unsubscribe, email [email protected]
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