Good Morning. Its Friday 10th April, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road...
Championship team of the season is revealed
The Yorkshire Evening Post took part, along with 14 other journalists covering teams in the second tier of English football to pick a Championship team of the season. Unsurprisingly, three Leeds players Ayling, White and Phillips all made the starting XI. Did they miss anyone out?
GK - Samba - Nottingham Forest
RB - Ayling - Leeds Utd
LB - Bryan - Fulham
CB - White - Leeds Utd
CB - Ajayi - West Brom
CM - Phillips - Leeds Utd
CM - Eze - QPR
RM- Pereira - West Brom
LM - Benrahma - Brentford
ST - Mitrovic - Fulham
ST - Watkins - Brentford
Who would you have in your Championship team of the year?
Leaked EFL sources reveal timescale for season to recommence
Leaked documentation from the EFL have revealed that all clubs in the Championship and lower leagues have been told to resume full training by 16th May at the latest. All 71 clubs were written to yesterday by EFL Chairman Rick Parry detailing plans to get their remaining fixtures underway.
Although a timescale was not been set, it is believed that games will get underway by mid June, with an aim of completing the remaining fixtures by August. Bielsa is set to tell his players to take a four week holiday (I hear West Yorkshire wil be a popular location for them). This will him them a chance to recharge their batteries.
Each club received the following letter from Rick Parry...
In other words, they still hope to be able to stage the finals at Wembley, but this cannot be guaranteed. It’s quite possible that the games will need to be played behind closed doors, at least to start with, and the letter says “It is our working assumption at this stage. We are absolutely mindful of the need to try and mitigate the cost of this to clubs as best as we can.”The EFL Board have determined that, to provide a level of certainty, clubs should be advised not to recommence any training activity with players until 16 May at the earliest.
Whenever the decision is taken that is safe to resume, we currently estimate that the league will require approximately 56 days to complete the outstanding matches in the season (including play-offs) and we are committed to ensuring that clubs are provided an appropriate notice period to ensure you are able to prepare operationally given the scale and impact of the postponements in place.
How and when we return [including training] is clearly subject to change and any decisions will be taken in conjunction with the Government and relevant health authorities. Clearly, we are in a position whereby the 2019-20 campaign will be extended, but still remain hopeful of a conclusion in the summer months.
The EFL Board is currently working on the basis that the end-of-season play-offs will take place across all three divisions as normal with two-legged semi-finals and a final, although no decision has been taken on the likely venue as it will depend on the circumstances at play at the time.
Phillips given cold shoulder by team mates after sending off
In a recent interview with Sky Sports, Luke Ayling revealed that Kalvin Phillips was given the cold shoulder by his Leeds United teammates after he was sent off against QPR. Phillips would go on to miss three cruital games following his straight red card for a reckless lunge on Geoff Cameron, sending the USA International defender sprawling in agony. Ayling revealed that he and his fellow teammates ignored Phillips...
We just ignored him! I went in after and said 'Kal, you've been silly',"
The game was pretty much done, we were going through a tough spell and Kalvin is such a big player for us. For him to be missing for three games was such a big loss. It really hurt us.
To be fair to him, though, he never made excuses. He said sorry and that he had been stupid. It shows his character that he knew he had done wrong.
Cooper added...
I couldn't look at him when he got sent off!
But I think, even if we were 1-0 up, Kalvin would still make that tackle. If you take that part out of his game you take out a lot of him. He plays on the edge sometimes, and that's like some of the best players in the world.
It can be a very good attribute to have.
