Former Leeds United midfielder Carlton Palmer has been full of praise for current Whites boss Marcelo Bielsa during a recent interview.
Bielsa arrived at Elland Road in the summer of 2018 and successfully guided the Yorkshire-based club back into the Premier League at the second attempt after a 16-year absence from the top flight of English football.
Leeds currently sit 12th in the table, having won four of their opening 10 fixtures, drawing twice and losing on four occasions. However, following a recent bad run of results in which they had lost three of their last four, including defeats at the hands of Wolves, Leicester City, and Crystal Palace, the Whites went on to take a point from Arsenal and then win at Goodison Park thanks to Raphinha’s late goal.
Speaking exclusively to This is Futbol, Palmer had plenty of positive things to say about the 65-year-old and the impact he has had in turning their form around. Here is what he had to say:
“I mean, the credit should go to the manager. I mean, if you look, I think they’d lost three games, four games on the bounce, conceding goals, then they’ve come back and they’ve had a draw against Arsenal, and beaten Everton and kept two clean sheets. That’s credit [to] the coach, that’s credit [to] the manager for acknowledging that they’re playing too open.
“He wants to play a pressing game, he wants to be open, but they were leaving themselves open to the counter-attack and he decided to still play the pressing game, but to tighten it up against two good sides, Arsenal and Everton – Everton who have been flying at the moment – and picked up four points. That’s a top coach, to be able to do that, and credit to his players who came up from the Championship, who were able to implement what he’s asked them to do – but they can only do that if they’re fit.”
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It’s clear from the above that Palmer, who represented the Whites between 1994 and 1997 is full of admiration for Bielsa and feels he was key in stopping the slump in form with some subtle changes to the way his team plays.
The Elland Road club travel down to London this weekend to take on Frank Lampard’s Chelsea and so in our view, although they’ve picked up some good results of late, they cannot afford to drop their level with difficult fixtures coming thick and fast.