Marching On Together

Leeds Utd v Wolverhampton Wanderers
Saturday 23rd October@15:00 | Elland Road


Wolves will be searching for their fourth win in successive games when they visit Elland Road on Saturday afternoon. After a slow start, Bruno Lage's team have recorded victories at St Marys, at home against Newcastle, and came from two goals down to win at Villa Park last weekend.

Francisco Trincao should return to the starting line up for the visitors. The Portuguese winger caught Covid whilst on International duty, but has now fully recovered. He is likely to replace former Leeds target Adama Traore!

Raphinha is set to return for the Whites. The inspirational winger had an incredible International break with five time World Cup winners Brazil. Two assists, two goals, and many more key passes firmly put the spotlight on the 24yo. Let's hope he can deliver similar performances for his club!

It seems unlikely that Kalvin Phillips will play, after it was revealed earlier in the week, that he developed a hip problem whilst recovering from his calf strain. Defensive trio Robin Koch, Junior Firpo and Luke Ayling will also miss out. Firpo picked up a muscular injury last Thursday that ruled him out of the trip to St Mary's whilst Koch and Ayling continue to recover from surgery. Ayling is responding well to treatment, and returned to light training at Thorp Arch earlier in the week.

It's not great news for Bamford either after Bielsa refused to put a time limit on how longer the England striker will be sidelined with his ankle injury. With Firpo, Koch, Ayling, Phillips and Bamford all but guaranteed to be sidelined, what is the best Leeds can hope for on Saturday?



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More points dropped due to the unavailability of Phillips

Can't really see us getting anything out of this one with all the injuries. Maybe if we have a Struijk/Llorente partnership at the back and give Bate and Geldhert a go who knows, we might have a chance. I know Raph is back but what's the point if he has no one to play the ball to? I'm despondent already.....

whiteswan wrote: ↑Thu Oct 21, 2021 9:09 am Can't really see us getting anything out of this one with all the injuries. Maybe if we have a Struijk/Llorente partnership at the back and give Bate and Geldhert a go who knows, we might have a chance. I know Raph is back but what's the point if he has no one to play the ball to? I'm despondent already.....

Me too Swannie.
More dross from Roberts and Rodrigo I expect.
I hope they make me eat my words but I doubt it.

Well I’ve already said that if we have one or two of Phillips, Raphinha or Bamford missing then we are going to struggle so it looks as though we are going to struggle!

All teams have injuries, of course they do, but this year we certainly seem to have had more than our fair share. Obviously Raphinha hasn’t been injured and will be back which will hopefully give us more attacking momentum than we had on Saturday (there couldn’t be much less) but Phillips is pivotal for not only the defence but especially the midfield. He seems to be able to be in the right place at the right time to close down the vast open spaces that, for example, Southampton were able to exploit on Saturday and I don’t think Struijk is able to read the game half as well as Phillips does.

Well football is a funny old game and sometimes Leeds lose when I’m expecting a win and sometimes they win when I’m expecting to lose, I just the latter is the case on Saturday.

Come on Leeds!

whiteswan wrote: ↑Thu Oct 21, 2021 9:09 am Can't really see us getting anything out of this one with all the injuries. Maybe if we have a Struijk/Llorente partnership at the back and give Bate and Geldhert a go who knows, we might have a chance. I know Raph is back but what's the point if he has no one to play the ball to? I'm despondent already.....

Drop Roberts, put Rodrigo in his place, and Gelhardt on his own up front with support from Raphinha come in from the right gives us our best chance imo. I feel it is necessary to have a goalscorer in the starting line up - forget his age, give him a start! That's what I would do!

Meslier
Shackleton (R)
Llorente
Cooper
Dallas (R)
Struijk (R)
Klich
Raphinha
James
Roberts
Rodrigo

Bielsa

"Kalvin is healthy, but he has not competed for three weeks. If he played on Saturday it would be far too quick. After three weeks out it's necessary for more training. At this stage he has done sessions for recovery and physical prep and progressive work with the ball. To think of him for Saturday would be too soon before his best"

FFS, no other coach leaves their best players out after a three weeks injury. KP can't have lost his match-fitness in that period.

That's three more points chucked away

No Firpo
KP
Koch (a month)

We are screwed.

KP will be back in time for the International break.

I can forsee a toxic afternoon this Saturday.

Irish Ian wrote: ↑Thu Oct 21, 2021 12:28 pm No Firpo
KP
Koch (a month)

We are screwed.

Yes we are Ian

Bamford & Ayling out for at two games too......will be more like 4 or 5 games as Marcelo won't play them unless they can run 100mph for 90 minutes.

You couldn't make this up!

Irish Ian wrote: ↑Thu Oct 21, 2021 12:29 pm KP will be back in time for the International break.

I can forsee a toxic afternoon this Saturday.

Not looking forward to it fully masked up on the coach & in the kop.

Irish Ian wrote: ↑Thu Oct 21, 2021 12:29 pm KP will be back in time for the International break.

I can forsee a toxic afternoon this Saturday.

I fear the atmosphere on Saturday if dross is served up again Ian. I don't want the fans to turn but I can't see the crowd putting up with another Southamptonesqe performance

Incoming defeat I'm afraid, only Wolves won't be as profligate as Southampton as they have better quality players up top.

Another gaping hole in midfield that becomes a black hole when KP is out, and Ruben Neves and co will have the freedom of Elland Road to stroll around and enjoy themselves.

I expect MB will go with the same old stuff, why would you change anything when these guys put in such a great effort and performance at winless Southampton? Opposition fans seem to frequently be saying "Ooh, that's the best we've played for ages" and the common denominator is they faced Leeds United:

Meslier
Shackleton
Llorente
Cooper
Dallas
Struijk
Klich
Roberts
Raphinha
Rodrigo
James

I would go with:
Meslier
Drameh
Llorente
Struijk
Dallas (Seen as we didn't bother to recruit cover for Firpo, why would you? all of our players are always available, so makes sense you would send Davis out on loan)
Bate (No other senior player capable of covering for KP, see Firpo above, but Bate will offer way more than Klich, or Dallas in that midfield))
Shackleton
Klich (Out of form and confidence, but again no cover)
Raphinha
Gelhardt
James

Worrying times, especially with the injuries to KP and Bamford, two of our five key men: Raphinha, Llorente and Meslier being the others.

This slump started in pre-season and still thriving 8 matches in to the season, and I'm not seeing it coming to an end any time soon.

No Philips again. Not expecting anything from this without him

Eireleeds1 wrote: ↑Thu Oct 21, 2021 12:43 pm No Philips again. Not expecting anything from this without him

No me neither, with KP out it just makes the job even easier for Wolves, they'll be licking their lips at the prospect of facing us

Irish Ian wrote: ↑Thu Oct 21, 2021 12:29 pm KP will be back in time for the International break.

I can forsee a toxic afternoon this Saturday.

If Leeds put in a performance like Southampton again, which should never happen, they'll rightly be getting a roasting, including our genius coach.

I hope Gelhardt gets a start but I’m pretty sure MB will start with the ineffective Rodrigo.

We need a massive reaction from the whole team as a minimum.

Ellandback1 wrote: ↑Thu Oct 21, 2021 9:53 am Drop Roberts, put Rodrigo in his place, and Gelhardt on his own up front with support from Raphinha come in from the right gives us our best chance imo. I feel it is necessary to have a goalscorer in the starting line up - forget his age, give him a start! That's what I would do!

Roberts n Rodrigo are a bust for me.
No Kalvin, so let's see if Bate can stop the cavalry charge on his own