{"id":338902,"date":"2025-08-12T16:39:17","date_gmt":"2025-08-12T16:39:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/338902\/"},"modified":"2025-08-12T16:39:17","modified_gmt":"2025-08-12T16:39:17","slug":"leeds-united-announcement-ditches-one-of-marcelo-bielsas-legacies-as-tune-changes-at-elland-road","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/338902\/","title":{"rendered":"Leeds United announcement ditches ‘one of Marcelo Bielsa\u2019s legacies’ as tune changes at Elland Road"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The era of Marcelo Bielsa feels like an age ago for Leeds United fans, but it is one that will long live in the memories of supporters who witnessed his achievements during his time in charge of the club.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Now manager of the Uruguayan national side, Marcelo Bielsa<\/a> is a modern day legend at Leeds United<\/a>. He guided the club to promotion to the Premier League in 2020, bringing Leeds United back to the top flight after a prolonged 16-year hiatus.<\/p>\n

Daniel Farke<\/a> has since replicated Bielsa\u2019s achievements. Last season, Leeds United won the Championship title<\/a> with Farke\u2019s side amassing an incredible 100 points, which is seven more than what the side did under Bielsa during their promotion season. <\/p>\n

And given the signs so far, it looks like Leeds are doing things a little differently this time round.<\/p>\n

\"MiddlesbroughPhoto by Stu Forster\/Getty ImagesLeeds United showing clear shift in mentality with the youth academy<\/p>\n

During his time as manager, and especially so in the Premier League, Bielsa was quite known for fielding younger academy<\/a> players, albeit not giving them huge amounts of gametime, but he gave them a place in the first-team<\/a> and often gave them minutes in the Premier League.<\/p>\n

Names like Ian Poveda, Oliver Casey, Charlie Cresswell, Niall Huggins, Leif Davies, Jamie Shackleton, and Sam Greenwood all played in the Premier League during the 2020\/21 season. But going into this season, it looks as though Leeds won\u2019t give so much focus towards younger players, and instead give minutes solely to more experienced first-team players in a bid to keep themselves in the Premier League.<\/p>\n

Whilst the opposite worked for Bielsa in his first Premier League season, the league has quickly changed and teams coming up from the Championship are finding it tougher and tougher to stay up. And Leeds\u2019 change of focus is evident with the recent appointment of Johnny Howson as a player\/coach<\/a> in the Leeds United academy.<\/p>\n

The former Whites hero has returned to the club after more than 13 years, and as Leeds United announced the news, they wrote on their website that: \u201cThe move is part of a longer-term strategy of the Academy, with the aim of fielding a young Under-21s side, ensuring early opportunities for our most talented youngsters who can be guided on the pitch by senior players, including the 37-year-old.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MarceloPhoto by Gareth Copley\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

MORE LEEDS UNITED STORIES<\/p>\n

\u2018One of Marcelo Bielsa\u2019s legacies\u2019 at Leeds United has now gone<\/p>\n

Former director of football at Elland Road<\/a>, Victor Orta, previously explained how having four spots in the first-team for youth players was \u2018one of Marcelo Bielsa\u2019s legacies\u2019. And the current Sporting Director, Adam Underwood, said in the same interview<\/a> when he was Academy Manager: \u201cIf you are very clear on how many players you are going to have in your first-team squad and stand by that and then do the same with players underneath, say in your 21s and 18s, you can guarantee opportunity down the line.\u201d<\/p>\n

So Howson\u2019s appointment and their new approach to giving youngsters experience certainly seems to have shifted from when Bielsa was in charge. But many will agree that it\u2019s a necessary shift given the growing void in quality between the Premier League and the Championship.<\/p>\n

And there\u2019s still youngsters in and around the side, like the Tottenham-linked Harry Gray<\/a>, Sam Chambers and Rhys Chadwick who could all make their Premier League debut at some point next season.<\/p>\n

If and when Leeds are more established in the top flight, then would be the time to start giving their academy starlets first-team exposure. In the meantime, they\u2019ll have to settle for either youth football or loan moves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The era of Marcelo Bielsa feels like an age ago for Leeds United fans, but it is one…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":338903,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8814],"tags":[748,393,4884,1860,23345,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-338902","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-leeds","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-england","10":"tag-great-britain","11":"tag-leeds","12":"tag-marcelo-bielsa","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115016785530362045","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338902","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=338902"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338902\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/338903"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=338902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=338902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=338902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}