Ever the non-comformist, Marcelo Bielsa likes to keep his Leeds United squad at the training ground from early in the morning to mid-evening, but they have evidently not been wasting their time. Long before the final whistle Gary Rowett’s own brand new Stoke City ensemble looked badly winded by Bielsa’s relentlessly pressing game; not to mention apparently bewildered by the home side’s kaleidoscopically flexible movement, with Leeds players inter-changing their positions at will.
It is no exaggeration to say that, courtesy of goals from Matuesz Klich, Pablo Hernández and Liam Cooper, Stoke were blown away in much the same manner as any specks of dust encountered by Bielsa during his daily housekeeping inspections at his team’s weekday base near Wetherby. Two hours before kickoff the queue on the motorway slip road approaching the Elland Road exit was already lengthy and, from there, the quarter-mile crawl to a crowded carpark took another 30 minutes.
Written by Louise Taylor at Elland Road
This news first appeared on https://www.theguardian.com/football/2018/aug/05/leeds-united-stoke-city-championship-match-report under the title “Leeds begin Marcelo Bielsa era with impressive victory over Stoke”. Bolchha Nepal is not responsible or affiliated towards the opinion expressed in this news article.
