Leeds United Must Beware Ending Up With an Earful of Rotherham Cider – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 25/01/2019 | 10 comments

Marcelo Bielsa – wily

In the great Broadway show Guys and Dolls, a young gambler sets out on his career with the following advice from his father: “One of these days in your travels, a guy is going to show you a brand-new deck of cards on which the seal is not yet broken. Then this guy is going to offer to bet you that he can make the jack of spades jump out of this brand-new deck of cards and squirt cider in your ear. But, son, do not accept this bet, because as sure as you stand there, you’re going to wind up with an ear full of cider.’

There is much wisdom to be found in classic scripts such as those produced from the tales of Damon Runyon, upon whose writings Guys and Dolls was based. Runyon’s name has even passed into the language as a byword for witty, pithy dialogue which is pleasing to the ear, has street wisdom undertones and is reminiscent of the shady world of the Broadway hood. If something is described as “Runyonesque”, you can be sure it will be clever, plausible and not lightly to be ignored or treated with anything but close attention and respect.

So when Rotherham United manager Paul Warne waxes lyrical about tomorrow’s opponents Leeds United, whilst simultaneously bemoaning his own club’s injury and sickness lists, the wise devotee of Elland Road, be they player, fan or even globally-renowned coach, will instantly be on the alert. Mr. Warne sounds full of respect for his opponents and equally full of world-weariness at the paucity of his own resources, but he is to be treated with caution, even as Runyon’s card sharp or – more classically – Greeks bearing gifts. The Rotherham boss has spoken sweetly about the Leeds United style of play, hinting at similarities with Manchester City. He has spoken dolefully of the Millers’ injuries and of a minor plague of illness affecting his squad. Already, I can almost feel the Strongbow trickling past my auricle and on towards my eardrum.

Fortunately, wily Leeds boss Marcelo Bielsa will be well-prepared for such unctuous softening-up – and for him, it will just be a matter of making sure his team, named once again on Thursday to give opposition spies an even break, are similarly prepared. Leeds certainly can and should win this game, but going into it in a complacent frame of mind is a sure way of ending up pointless and leaking cider from both ears. Still, as Runyon also memorably said, “The race may not always be to the swift nor the victory to the strong, but that’s how you bet.”

Bielsa, for his part, has merely commented that both teams have their own way of playing, and that they will both go ahead and perform according to those differing plans. It’s worthy of note that the Millers have been far stronger at home than away this season, but also that they fell on their own turf to Brentford last week by four goals to two. All of which, plus Leeds’ own patchy recent form, makes this one difficult to call.

Still, in Bielsa we trust. His cards are on the table at least in part, with the starting eleven for Leeds named yesterday, though the make up of his substitute’s bench is as yet unknown. Perhaps it is from there that a jack of spades may yet emerge to squirt cider into Rotherham’s unsuspecting ears, turning the mind-game tables on that nice Mr Warne. In the topsy turvy world of Runyonland, otherwise known as the English Championship, anything is possible.

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Football Differences of Leeds Utd, Norwich and Cardiff Fade Amid Triple Tragedy – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 23/01/2019 | 11 comments
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Leeds United’s Liam Cooper with young Toby Nye, who sadly passed away this month

As anyone who follows football online as well as in real life will know, there’s usually a bit of “banter” between fans of rival clubs – and there’s even the odd dedicated “banter” forum on the Internet, to facilitate this. Sometimes it jogs along on a fairly friendly basis, other times, friendly is not exactly the word. But occasionally – and now is one of those times – even the agitated banter between fans of clubs who really don’t normally have a lot of love for each other tends to fade away in the perspective of true human loss. At those times, football is relegated to the back seat it should always occupy when more serious and compelling matters come to the fore.

Lately, fate has dealt cruel blows to both Leeds United and Norwich City, of an almost identical nature, making such matters as Spygate or Norwich’s away dressing room makeover look as trivial and irrelevant as they really are. First, on January 12th, young United fan Toby Nye lost his brave battle against neuroblastoma, just days after his sixth birthday, passing away with his family around him. On Friday, Toby will make one last journey past the Leeds United ground at Elland Road, on the way to a celebration of his life.

The story echoed that of Bradley Lowery, the six-year-old Sunderland fan who died in July 2017, also from neuroblastoma. Bradley had formed a close friendship with ex-Sunderland striker Jermain Defoe when he became a mascot for the team, and Toby too had a big mate in the Leeds squad, with club skipper Liam Cooper among others closely involved in supporting and encouraging the young Leeds fan’s fight against this awful illness right up to the end. Cooper, who had once carried Toby on to the pitch at Elland Road, said on Twitter he was “heartbroken to hear that my little mate has peacefully passed”.

Just days later, there was news of another and tragically similar loss, as young Norwich City fan Sophie Taylor passed away at the age of five from osteosarcoma, a type of cancer that originates in the bones and had, in Sophie’s case, progressed to her lungs. Sophie, as in the cases of Bradley Lowery and Toby Nye, had formed a special attachment to one of her Norwich heroes, midfielder James Maddison. Although Maddison had moved on from Carrow Road to Leicester City last summer, he kept in touch with Sophie’s condition and was clearly devastated by news of her passing. In a touching Twitter message, Maddison wrote “Rest In Peace my little Angel. I love you always & forever.”

And, just in the past day or so, we have heard the news of Cardiff City‘s record signing Emiliano Sala who is missing after the aeroplane he was travelling on from Nantes to Cardiff disappeared from radar over the English Channel. This situation is still a developing one, but it appears that a happy ending – while devoutly hoped and prayed for – is unlikely, given the time of year and the temperature of sea waters. Meanwhile, Sala’s parents in Argentina are left hoping against hope that there will be better news forthcoming, while fans of both his old club, Nantes, and his new team Cardiff are united in what is becoming more a case of mass grief than any real hope.

Death is the one real certainty for all of us, with its timing being the main factor that will accentuate or mitigate the level of tragedy associated with each sad departure. The death of children, those poor little angels who have had such a brief shot at life before being snatched away, is, of course, acutely tragic and mourned with a level of intensity and shock, as we have seen. But the loss of a young man with talent and the world at his feet is also something profoundly to regret, and – if confirmed – will touch literally thousands of lives. In all of these cases, human nature has asserted itself, mundane rivalries and mutual irritations have been put aside – and everybody has concentrated on what’s really important, to the exclusion of club rivalries. And that is exactly as it should be.

Life, Leeds United, the Universe & Everything therefore extends sympathy and condolences to anyone connected to the three young angels recently departed, and also to those affected by the probable loss of a major football talent. It’s a great pity that it seems to take events such as these to remind people of what’s really important and, in that respect, I’m no less guilty than anyone else. But I suppose it’s reassuring also to know – because we have seen it happen – that, when tragedy does strike, people of different outlooks and affiliations will come together in the common cause of mutual support and comfort. At the end of the day, against a background of ever-present strife, that’s the most important thing of all.

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Media Moving on from Spygate for Concerted Effort to Sell Leeds Star Jack Clarke – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 23/01/2019 | 29 comments

Leeds United’s Jack Clarke – the poise of the matador

The UK sports media don’t like Leeds United to have nice things. The recent embarrassing emphasis on so-called “Spygate” – the sensational exposé of a man in a tracksuit on a public highway by a wire fence, failing to avert his eyes from the spectacle of some footballers training in plain sight – was of course intended to derail the United promotion bandwagon, but Leeds have still won eight of the last eleven and are clear at the the top. All the hacks have accomplished really is to emphasise their own essential silliness. So – what to do?

Well, it’s transfer window time and, for your average grubby hack with a Leeds-hating readership to satisfy, what better opportunity for the talking up of the latest United wonderkid in the hope of provoking an auction? Such seems to be the mindset of the gutter end of the media right now, not excluding our good friends at Sky, who are positively schizo over Leeds United, simultaneously hating and capitalising on Yorkshire’s number one football club. The current focus is on United’s Jack Clarke, a young wing wizard with that touch of genius about him. The hacks have seen this divine spark, have noted it well – and are determined to bring about his departure from Elland Road at the earliest opportunity.

The stories have cropped up thick and fast – mostly the former, it has to be said – over the past few days. One mischievous rag, conscious of Leeds fans’ lack of regard for Devon’s Finest, have even linked him with Manchester’s second biggest club. Perhaps they feel young Jack would prosper under what they’re selling as the Norwegian reincarnation of Matt Busby, clearly a better mentor than some Argie who sits on a bucket.

Sky were in on the act today as well, playing tempting clips of young Clarke bamboozling full-backs and sticking the ball in the net. It’s all designed to whip up interest from one or other of their favoured clubs because, alas, so far the only enquiries seem to have been  joke ones, from the likes of Crystal Palace and Southampton – hardly the stuff of a young winger’s dreams. Meanwhile, Jack is thriving at Leeds, in and around the first team, contributing solidly to the promotion push, and with the alluring prospect of a fat new contract and maybe a Championship winner’s medal in the offing. For those who wish Leeds ill, namely just about everyone who doesn’t bleed yellow blue and white, these are not good feelings.

Let’s be honest, Jack Clarke at 18 looks to be the real deal. He has that matador’s poise, the ability to play a bewildered defender into hopeless confusion and ultimate defeat. Only the other day, he destroyed the opposing Derby County full-back, who was promptly dispatched to Aberdeen with twisted blood, there to reflect and convalesce, having been replaced at Derby by a pensioner. Clarke has the nascent promise of a youthful Stan Matthews – there’s no deep, dark secret as to how he beats his man. He dances for a moment, in possession of the ball – will the defender sell himself, or just back off, quivering? Then – a drop of the shoulder, a change of pace, and Jack is gone, leaving his man in a crumpled heap, arrowing a deadly ball into the box, and Roofe is there to snap up the chance. Or maybe Clarke swerves back on his path into the box, and curls the ball inside the far post. You just don’t know, although that initial beating of the full back, that’s an open secret. You know how he’ll do that. But, as with Stan Matthews, stopping it is another matter entirely. The media knows all this, and they’re agreed: Clarke must go from Leeds.

But anyone who knows the game will know that Jack Clarke is in the best place he could be, especially at this time of his fledgling career. Quite apart from the material and competitive career rewards dangling in front of him, he’s working with the best coach in Marcelo Bielsa that he could possibly wish for, and in a team that might have been set up specifically to showcase his devastating talent. At eighteen, Clarke needs to be protected from the predatory and kept close to the nurturing influence from which he’s currently benefiting. Jack has the role models right now, in the coaching set up and alongside him in the team, that will give his genius the best chance of emerging in full bloom. To dump him into a so-called “elite” development squad would be to risk seeing that potential stifled, instead of being honed, as it is now, under Bielsa and alongside the likes of Pablo Hernandez.

Leeds United themselves, thankfully, seem to have become a lot more selective in terms of both squad augmentation and pruning. The development squad is being enhanced with a succession of quality additions, and the progression from there to first team level is a clear path. United also recognise and reward the diamonds yielded by this rich seam, polishing some for display on a grand stage, profiting from others judiciously, with the dividend being ploughed back. It’s a policy designed to reap ever richer harvests in the near future – showing that this is a club at long last on the right track. We can safely assume that United will no longer accept derisory offers from smaller clubs for a short term profit that denies them progress and a longer term bounty.

If I’m correct about all that, then – all media hue, cry and desperation notwithstanding – young Jack Clarke will remain exactly he is, shining and dazzling on either wing, tormenting opposing defences with his prodigious, precocious talent, in the colours of Leeds United, settled and happy on the brink of a sensational career. Which is exactly what we would all of us wish and hope for.

Sky Sports et al not included.

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The Football League Should be Apologising to Leeds Utd, Not Investigating Them – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 21/01/2019 | 27 comments
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Football League board – time to say “sorry” to Leeds United

Any balanced view of this season’s Championship competition will naturally focus on its most prominent, most talked about, most successful and most controversial club and coach – namely Leeds United and Marcelo Bielsa. And that view, if it really is sufficiently balanced, will be that both club and coach are by far more sinned against than sinning. The Football League, instead of announcing yet another investigation into their biggest attraction, following the latest ridiculously overhyped storm in a teacup, should instead be issuing a grovelling apology to the players, staff and fans of Leeds United – because the Whites have ascended to and maintained their position at the top of the table with what is effectively a millstone around their collective neck.

Consider the evidence. Against a background of a disastrous injury list which has blighted most of the season so far, the League has consistently acted, via their supposedly neutral on-field arbiters, to make life far more difficult than that heavy casualty count alone would have achieved. As if it’s not enough for United to be labouring under the burden of the loss of so many key players, they have also been denied stonewall penalty after stonewall penalty, on an almost game-by-game basis, while some of the softest awards you can imaging have been given at the other end. The Leeds penalty award count now stands at one in around seventy league matches, a quite ridiculous proportion for a team that regularly has a high number of touches in the opposition area.

And it’s not just penalties. Pontus Jansson, victim of a stupidly soft second yellow card at the weekend, has already served a ban this season for comments about the match referee, made in the immediate aftermath of a hotly contested game. Identical incidents elsewhere resulted in no charge and no further action, but Pontus was banned – seemingly for the offence of committing his indiscretion while wearing a Leeds United shirt. Now Jansson will be banned again for the away game at Rotherham, having been sent off ultimately at Stoke for falling over in pursuit of a Stoke attacker whose progress was not impeded in any way.

And of course, there’s Spygate – something the League clearly sees as a golden chance to throw a spanner in the works of what is, so far, a remarkably successful season for a squad which is basically last season’s also-rans plus a scattering of talented kids. From the outside looking in, the mountain of a formal investigation being made out of the molehill of a bloke on a public highway looking through a wire fence at Derby players training in plain sight is truly laughable. The League do not seem to shy away from the prospect of making the,selves look very silly over this, prompted by a select group of rival Championship clubs who clearly see no alternative way of pegging Leeds back. It’s almost as if the League don’t want to see Leeds United leaving their jurisdiction, for some (possibly financial) reason – but surely, that can’t be the case. Can it?

If Leeds United succeeds in attaining promotion this season, as they still appear on course to do, it will be little short of a miracle. With few high profile additions, and those with serious injury problems, the team performance has been transformed out of all recognition as compared to last season. That is the genius of Marcelo Bielsa, and credit to the squad for buying into his methods and philosophy. But that this group of players, supplemented where necessary by callow youth, should be dominating each game and the whole campaign with such obstacles laid so regularly in their way, is truly remarkable. Leeds and Bielsa deserve a vast amount of credit for their revolutionary approach to bring about such radical improvement, and surely all true Leeds fans will happily pay tribute to exactly that.

But Leeds and Bielsa also deserve perhaps even greater credit for rising above the needless and frivolous forces working against them, whether those forces may be incompetent refereeing as is demonstrably the case in so many fixtures, or indeed the pettifogging attitude of the ruling body, so ready to pounce on a virtual non-issue and magnify it into something that has the anti-Leeds media frothing over with malicious excitement.

This daft investigation should be concluded speedily, with any necessary clarification of rules, or any new rules, made clear forthwith. Leeds must be acknowledged as having broken no existing rules; instead they have merely acted, through the experience and long-standing methodology of Bielsa, as many have acted in the past, including such a luminary as Jose Mourinho (by his own admission and despite limp denials from Frank Lampard). That should all happen at the earliest possible juncture.

And then the League, in recognition of the myriad ways they have failed their biggest club this season, should hold up their hands, eat a large slice of humble pie – and say “sorry” to Leeds United.

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Leeds Fans’ Horror and Disgust at Holier Than Thou Frank Lampard’s 9/11 Shame – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 18/01/2019 | 55 comments

 

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Lampard – holier than thou?

Anyone who’s paid any attention to the sanctimonious ramblings of Derby County manager Frank Lampard Jr, ever since the ever more ridiculous Spygate row emerged, would surely be surprised if not totally shocked at the apparent hypocrisy displayed by this erstwhile member of England’s “Golden Generation”. Lampard, despite prefacing many of his Spygate press answers over the past week with “I really don’t want to talk about that again”, has nevertheless lost few opportunities to express his angelic disapproval of the heinous crime committed by a Leeds United employee, to wit: standing on a public highway and looking through a wire mesh fence instead of averting his eyes. How distasteful it is, then, to discover that Lampard has at least one skeleton in his closet that puts a spot of football espionage distinctly in the shade.

It turns out – and I’ll warn you now if you’re a Fwankie Fan, you’d better look away here – that Lampard, together with three then Chelsea team-mates, found it funny and entertaining to mock and ridicule some grieving American tourists in London just twenty-four hours after the 9/11 Twin Towers attacks in 2001. 

A manager at Heathrow’s Post House hotel, where the disgraceful incident occurred, said: “They were utterly disgusting. They just didn’t seem to care about what had happened. We had a lot of Americans here and were simply trying to comfort them in their hour of need. Meanwhile these men were laughing and joking, taking off their clothes and abusing our guests.” Another witness said: “One of them was walking around laughing with everything hanging out, while on TV there were crying firemen searching for bodies. It was sick.”

The nature and timing of such shameful behaviour rather takes your breath away and, even allowing for the fact that boys will be boys etc, the disgusting lack of respect and empathy for people still shocked and stunned by the appalling events in Manhattan is hard to describe – except, perhaps, to remind those lining up to condemn Marcelo Bielsa and Leeds United that there have been worse things going on at various times, despite vociferous attempts to paint Spygate as an Eighth Deadly Sin.

Looking back over the past week, with this appalling episode in mind, it’s hard to stomach the holier-than-thou look on Lampard’s face as he’s presumed to lecture somebody of vastly superior character, experience and ability about matters such as morals and ethics. And it’s difficult to imagine a clearer case of gutter hypocrisy. Of course, it was a long time ago. But Lampard was no callow teenager, he was a 23-year old who had been awarded representative honours by his country and so was expected to be some sort of ambassador for the nation. Such behaviour is the mark of an arrogant and uncaring thug, and there will be those who would argue that such leopards do not change their spots.

For my part, whatever the eventual outcome of Spygate, I will take no lectures or homilies from Mr Lampard about ethics, morality or anything else. He showed his true colours over 17 years ago, and we can surely be in no doubt as to the less than genuine nature of his carefully cultivated victim persona over the past few days.

Frank Lampard is a media darling, that’s clear enough. But he’s also, at bottom, a nasty little person demonstrably capable of the very worst of human nature. We should all remember that, the next time his hypocritical boat race appears, begging for sympathy and understanding, on our TV screens.

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Brave Collymore Threatens Leeds Tweeter Jamie, Then Realises It Might Be a Bloke – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 17/01/2019 | 18 comments

The Spygate furore continues to divide football people, with fans and pundits alike taking entrenched positions either side of the common sense threshold. Despite the emotive nature of the argument, arising out of the emotional nature of the initial complainant, Derby’s Frank Lampard, the exchanges have remained mostly courteous. But there’s always the exception, which brings me on to Stan Collymore.

Stan is well known for a tendency to use force when his brain runs out of ideas – just as long as the recipient of the violence is unable, for gender reasons, to hit back. This was amply demonstrated when Stan was somehow upset in a Paris bar by his then girlfriend Ulrika Jonsson. With Ulrika being both female and on the petite side, Stan saw no reason to mess about and nothing to fear, so he used his hands to settle his girlfriend’s hash good and proper. Brave man! When this incident crops up these days, Stan likes to remind people that Ulrika sustained no bruising which, in Collymore’s bizarre world, seems to make it all ok.

Stan is also fond of reminding people who disapprove of violence towards women that he has suffered from depression and a borderline personality disorder – but, sadly for the hero of the airwaves, some appear to feel that’s no excuse. Collymore still gets upset though, when anyone has the temerity to refer to that time he hit Ulrika, and he still likes to hint at dishing out the treatment in cases where it appears safe to do so.

Accordingly, when a Leeds United tweeter called Jamie made some passing reference to his violence towards Ms Jonsson, Stan had no hesitation in peddling a variation on the classic keyboard warrior line of “come and have a go if you think you’re hard enough” – but seemed bemused into silence when other Leeds tweeters pointed out that “Jamie” could easily be a bloke, and therefore not on the Collymore list of safe targets.

It’s all quite disgusting, of course, but probably to be expected of someone who styles himself an award winning broadcaster, presumably to compensate for the embarrassing fact that he won the square root of sod-all as a footballer. There’s some insecurity and anxiety going on there, and that should be recognised. But if Stan’s going to stick his head above the parapet in his current career, to make daft remarks about a bona fide legend in Bielsa, then he must expect to be targeted in the odd salty response, with references to his unfortunate past thrown in.

It’d be nice also if Collymore could refrain from hinting at violence, even if it’s only in cases where he possibly thinks his target is female. Then again, sadly, leopards don’t tend to change their spots.

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Football League Investigates Leeds but Finds Itself Corrupt by Mistake – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 15/01/2019 | 12 comments

In an amazing twist, the Football League’s probe into the Leeds United “Spygate” allegation has led to a finding that the League itself is corrupt and not fit for purpose. A red-faced FL spokesman admitted that the findings themselves are real enough, but that the direction of the investigation was misconceived. “We didn’t mean to probe ourselves,” the man from the FL confirmed, “That was just an embarrassing mistake that stemmed from noticing Shaun Harvey’s eyes are too close together. But, because the error happened, we now find that we’re utterly corrupt, useless and totally bent out of shape – so I suppose we’ll have to do something about that, like ban ourselves or whatever. It’s all a bit bemusing, all we wanted to do was rattle Leeds United a bit. Deary me”.

What happens next is unclear. The League could appeal against its own findings, but we understand that it’s struggling to find grounds. “We appear to be bang to rights on being as corrupt as you could imagine”, said our man, gloomily. One possibility is that the League might disband itself and turn control of the FL72 over to some less obviously useless organisation, such as the BBC or the Tory Party. The next few days should be very interesting.

Meanwhile, Leeds United are free to continue with preparations for their match at Stoke on Saturday, and a furtive gentleman dressed inconspicuously outside the Potters’ training ground put down his binoculars long enough to confirm that the pre-match build up was “going as well as can be expected”.

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Football League See Opportunity to Keep Leeds United Within Their Clammy Grasp – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 15/01/2019 | 35 comments

As many of us at least half expected, the football authorities in this country are refusing to see the Derby County “Spygate” storm in a teacup for what it is. Instead, they are assuming their grave and serious faces, and preparing to set the wheels in motion to hammer Leeds United yet again.

It’s no secret that the Football League in particular, driven by the hateful legacy of the late, unlamented Alan Hardaker, have a schizophrenic attitude towards Leeds comprised of love and hate in roughly equal measure. The hatred is a stand alone thing; like the silly kid down your street with a scum shirt on, they despise Leeds but can’t really say why, beyond a vague feeling that their dead dad would approve. The love bit is commercially-motivated: the FL simply do not wish to lose the jewel in their crown to the Premier League.

So, this ridiculous whinge from Lampard and Derby is embarrassingly being given some credence, against all sense and logic, simply because it might just open the door to a chance of clipping Leeds United’s wings. That’s the reality, that’s the measure of the League’s determination to hang onto us if they can. Against a background of one penalty award in almost 70 games, the mood in the Preston HQ is clear enough.

We now have to wait and see what the Leeds United response will be to the ominous “request for comments” on an incident which is demonstrably not without precedent. I hope that the club is prepared to set out its stall and indicate its determination not to be intimidated or cowed down by this, together with its absolute resolve to resist vigorously any attempt to apply sanctions that would threaten a highly promising situation as regards promotion.

As for the fans, we should be prepared to lobby the League in our thousands. Something like this was always likely to happen, especially with Leeds four points clear and set fair to move up and away. The League’s determination to throw a spanner in the Leeds United works must not be tolerated. If they want a fight, let’s give them a bloody good one.

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Leeds’ Bielsa to be Coach of the Year, But Derby’s Lampard Favourite for Whinger Award – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 15/01/2019 | 20 comments

Fwankie – look at his poor little FACE!!

Whatever might be said about the relative coaching merits of Frank Lampard and Marcelo Bielsa – and it hardly needs pointing out here that the rookie has been utterly owned by the Master twice this season – there do appear to be serious doubts about young Frank’s mental durability, for want of a more appropriate phrase, given his incessant and piteous whinging over what they’re glibly calling “Spygate”.

Sadly for Frank, many of the game’s more respected voices have been united in scorn at the bleating that has emanated from the Rams’ pen over the past few days. As a general rule, those with global reputations have dismissed Lampard’s complaints as ridiculous, while poor Frankie has had to make do with lesser authorities, woman-beater Stan Collymore for instance, in his corner.

There’s also the problem for an increasingly sullen and sulky Lampard that evidence is piling up to the effect that what Sky have attempted to portray as an earth-shattering scoop has actually happened with great regularity down the years. Two of these historical incidences of espionage and skullduggery involve Chelsea at a time when Lampard was a player there – the most bizarre case involving Jose Mourinho allegedly circumventing a stadium ban by means of concealment within a laundry hamper.

More relevant to Spygate is the admission of Andre Villas-Boas that he was regularly sent by Mourinho to opposition training grounds, often incognito, to suss out team news and tactics for the benefit of Jose’s match preparation. Get that, sent incognito to gather information – what more comprehensive description of spying could there possibly be? But Frank appears to be saying that his former coach Villas-Boas is a big fat liar; “I didn’t know about this and, anyway, it didn’t happen” seems to be the Lampard position.

It’s all most unseemly, and all Lampard appears to be gaining with his protracted whinging is a well-deserved reputation as a petulant ninny. And that’s hardly the kind of image you expect of the manager of a club in the muck and bullets Championship, even if it’s only Derby. But Frank seems intent on stamping his feet and complaining until somebody does something – and with the alleged offenders being perennial establishment targets Leeds United, I suppose that can’t be ruled out. But, in this blogger’s humble if not exactly disinterested opinion, all Lampard is achieving thus far is to cast himself as a petulant and childish fool.

This Championship season to date has been all about Bielsa; with a minimum of recruitment, he has transformed last year’s anonymous also-rans into stylish table toppers – as well as implementing a football ethos throughout the club that has seen both the Under 23s and Under 18s topping their respective leagues as well. If this carries on, it’ll be Marcelo first and the rest nowhere when it comes to Coach of the Year.

And Lampard? Well, we can probably close that book right now. With his desperately pitiful demeanour in defeat, and his sullen insistence on ridiculous excuses straight from the embroidered spy story pages of Girls’ Own, “Lamps” has no real rivals for the title of Whinger of the Season. So smile, Frankie lad – this is one trophy you’ll win easily, even at serial also-rans Derby County.

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Leeds Loan Star Brown: Izzy Making the Bench for Stoke Away? – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 14/01/2019 | 12 comments

Given that Leeds United’s loan signing from Chelsea, Izzy Brown, successfully negotiated 90 minutes of a development squad match today, scoring a brace to secure victory, many will be wondering if we might be about – at long, long last – to see the talented midfielder involved at first team level for the Whites.

It’s an intriguing question, especially insofar as next Saturday’s fixture at Stoke is concerned, as Kalvin Philips will be serving the last of a three match ban. Against that, the eleven that started against Derby probably all deserve to retain their places. But the bench for that game was seriously inexperienced – so is that where we could see Izzy Brown starting off on Saturday?

My guess would be that, given Brown’s own “almost there” verdict after his second string appearance today, it’s reasonably likely that the lively midfielder will be involved at least as a sub against Stoke. And that would provide a great new option for Marcelo Bielsa, depending on how that game is going.

Brown’s imminent first team availability is well timed, with the second half of the season well under way, and the prospect of other returnees such as Bamford, Dallas, Douglas and Berardi perhaps a little further down the line. The received wisdom amongst United fans is that squad reinforcements are urgently needed – and yet the squad has coped magnificently with the rigours of the campaign so far. The appearance of Izzy on the bench at Stoke could herald the spectacle of a United squad pulsing with strength in depth for what will hopefully be a run-in to the Championship Title and automatic promotion.

Fingers crossed, whatever happens with Izzy Brown next weekend, for another three points at Stoke City. But, however that goes, the return of a few injured stars as well as the fresh dimension offered by Brown and the likes of emerging talents Shackleton and Clarke surely bodes well for the immediate future of Leeds United.

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