Good Morning. It's Thursday 17th December, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road...
Seven goal thriller at Elland Road
Nobody can ever say that games involving Leeds Utd are ever boring, and even though mistakes were plentiful, forgiveness will be given when you witness the quality of the attacking. Goals from Bamford, Rodrigo, Dallas, Alioski and goal of the season contender from Harrison put the game beyond the Magpies reach, but they only stretched their advantage in the last 13 minutes. Before this point Steve Bruce's men had scored from 50 percent of their on target chances. Leeds on the other hand recorded the most strike on goal from any Premiership team this season (25), with 10 being on target.
The Whites have now scored 22 goals; looking at the Premiership table, you have to go all the way up to 6th place (Chelsea) to find a team that have scored more. Conceding has been Leeds problem this season, especially from set pieces, but is this a new problem? A staggering 37.14% of goals conceded came from dead ball situations last season. It did not matter so much last season as Leeds were able to outscore their opponents. If truth be known Leeds under Bielsa has never been good at defending set pieces!
During Steve Bruce's presser he thought the Barcodes had matched Leeds for the first 78 minutes. Thoughts?
Post match reactions
Leeds Manager - Marcelo Bielsa
Newcastle Manager - Steve Bruce
Hernandez is back, but for how long?
Pablo Hernandez became the oldest player (35 yrs 249 days) to assist twice in a Premier League game for Leeds since Gordon Strachan (age 36) in November 1993 v Swindon. He was bought on by Bielsa with just eight minutes and injury time remaining. In that short amount of time the Spanish veteran set up the goals for Alioski and Harrison.
Should Hernandez be starting games, and coming off after an hour, or would he have more impact from the bench? Have Leeds missed Hernandez over the past 6 games?
