Why Leeds United are hoping for another new year reset under Marcelo Bielsa

At this time in the calendar, we journalists like to look back on the year gone and forward to what lies ahead.

Never one to spare himself when it comes to criticism, Leeds United coach Marcelo Bielsa was in no mood to dress up his own performance in the first half of the season as anything other than not good enough.

Whatever else is wrong at Elland Road, there is certainly no risk of complacency holding the Whites back.

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So quickly does football move, it is easy to forget what a momentous start Leeds made to 2021.

Welcome return: Leeds winger Dan James, above, is in the squad to face Burnley. Picture Tony JohnsonWelcome return: Leeds winger Dan James, above, is in the squad to face Burnley. Picture Tony Johnson
Welcome return: Leeds winger Dan James, above, is in the squad to face Burnley. Picture Tony Johnson

Nowadays a newly-promoted side finishing in the top half of the Premier League is a big deal, especially when the time out of it stretches to 16 years. The problem for Leeds was that finishing ninth raised expectations – including their own – yet they start 2022 welcoming Burnley for a real relegation ding-dong.

There are reasons for it. Injuries, better now than when they faced Arsenal in their previous match but still challenging, are one. Some of the players so outstanding as Leeds struck a better post-Christmas 2020 balance between defence and attack to turn a good first half of the season into an even better second have lost form.

In Bielsa’s eyes, though, the biggest failings are his.

“The evaluation of my task these past few months is negative, the situations we’ve had to go through, I wasn’t able to solve them as I thought I would,” he says. “The majority of the things that I thought could happen, I imagined resources could resolve them but evidently those resources weren’t the adequate ones even if there was a high percentage of injuries and those are things you can’t pre-empt, even less so in the proportion that it was.

Defensive boost: Junior Firpo returns to the Leeds United squad for the game against Burnley. (Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images)Defensive boost: Junior Firpo returns to the Leeds United squad for the game against Burnley. (Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
Defensive boost: Junior Firpo returns to the Leeds United squad for the game against Burnley. (Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
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“The rest of the things that define the lowering in performance, I thought they could happen and I wasn’t able to resolve them.”

Now the question is whether Leeds can reset, as they did last Christmas. At that stage they had conceded 30 goals in 14 games, followed by 24 in the next 24, although they were scoring more than they are now and those pesky injuries were not crippling them.

Junior Firpo (suspension), Dan James (injury) and Diego Llorente (Covid) are available again, Jack Harrison has recovered from the knock he picked up against Arsenal and Robin Koch has had a little bit more training since he returned that day. Patrick Bamford is back too, but without any football since he injured his hamstring against Brentford on December 5.

“The game on Sunday is a great opportunity to redirect where the season is going,” says Bielsa.

Blame me: Marcelo Bielsa has again taken the blame for Leeds United's woes this season. 
Picture Bruce RollinsonBlame me: Marcelo Bielsa has again taken the blame for Leeds United's woes this season. 
Picture Bruce Rollinson
Blame me: Marcelo Bielsa has again taken the blame for Leeds United's woes this season. Picture Bruce Rollinson
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Getting much work in has been difficult, though, with a wave of coronavirus which forced Thorp Arch to be closed and will test the recovery powers of those who have come through it.

“It’s common that in a group three or four players are missing but when a group is missing 12, 13 players it’s a lot more difficult to manage,” comments Bielsa. “Collectively it’s less possible to work on tactics but individually you attempt to do exercises.

“We try to develop the collective mechanism, the co-ordinations, the closeness between the whole team, the support, all of the aspects that make the capacity of the opponent and allows errors to be resolved.”

There was no good news but at least some clarity on the longer-term absentees as Bielsa casually dropped the timescales he has been so reticent about revealing recently into the conversation.

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“We’ve been recovering players, even if (Kalvin) Phillips and (Liam) Cooper will return in March,” he says when asked about the January transfer window. “Even if (Jamie) Shackleton and (Charlie) Cresswell come back towards at the end of January, or the beginning of February, the amount of players available will be increased.”

If Leeds’s injury situation has been infuriatingly hard to predict this season beyond what can go wrong doing so, at least there are tens of thousands of people Bielsa can rely on.

The support Leeds had in their last two matches - dispiritingly heavy defeats away at Manchester City and at home to Arsenal - was incredible.

“Every time we’ve played at home the public has always pushed the team to be in a better mood,” says Bielsa, the slightly clipped, translated version of his technocratic language perhaps disguising just how impressed and appreciative he is of it.

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“The support the Leeds fans have for the team is unconditional. It’s not common in these times to conserve that recognition from the fans even when the team is losing.”

Importantly – though he will see it as utterly irrelevant – that support is not only directed at whichever 11 players happen to be wearing the shirt that afternoon but also the man squatting down or sat on an upturned bucket in the technical area. The number of times Leeds fans sang his name on their last visit to Elland Road made it plain that however much he blames himself for the team going into the new year 16th in the Premier League, they are far more forgiving. That only helps a board which clearly wants to stand by its manager too, and given how he has transformed the club over the last three-and-a-half years, really ought to.

Even if this unscheduled two-week winter break does become a turning point of the season, Bielsa has life far too firmly in context to count his blessings.

“The illness of a group of players can never be considered as positive even if it generates alternative consequences that can be valued,” he replies. “What promotes it is sufficiently serious to not value it.”

However it has come about, though, tomorrow does represent the chance for a fresh start. New years always do.