{"id":349730,"date":"2025-08-16T18:02:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-16T18:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/349730\/"},"modified":"2025-08-16T18:02:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-16T18:02:11","slug":"leeds-united-star-has-brilliant-response-after-joel-piroe-told-him-he-needs-to-improve-a-lot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/349730\/","title":{"rendered":"Leeds United star has brilliant response after Joel Piroe told him he ‘needs to improve a lot’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Leeds United under-21s got off to a winning start in the Premier League 2 on Friday night, dumping Aston Villa 3-0.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Leeds United<\/a> under-21s made a strong start to the new season on Friday night. Alfie Cresswell was on the score sheet along with Harry Gray<\/a> who scored a brace as Leeds United ended up beating Villa 3-0.<\/p>\n

For Daniel Farke<\/a>, there may be a few in the academy ranks who will be keeping his eye on this season, with Gray perhaps the pick of the bunch. The 16-year-old made his first-team<\/a> debut for last season and Leeds fans were immediately impressed with Gray\u2019s potential<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So too were the Premier League vultures with reports linking Spurs with a move for Gray<\/a> after the North London club signed his brother Archie Gray from Leeds United last summer. But there remains a way to go for Gray, at least according to striker Joel Piroe.<\/p>\n

\"LeedsPhoto by Robbie Jay Barratt \u2013 AMA\/Getty ImagesJoel Piroe thinks Harry Gray still has a long way to go at Leeds United<\/p>\n

It was quite the summer for teenager Gray, who featured in friendly games for Leeds United against the likes of Manchester United, Villarreal, and AC Milan. Farke\u2019s striker options were previously very low on the ground, with Piroe and Lukas Nmecha being the only realistic options ahead of Gray, with Mateo Joseph having left on loan<\/a>, and Patrick Bamford looking completely out of the picture.<\/p>\n

On Friday, Leeds United signed Dominic Calvert-Lewin<\/a>, and so it looks like Gray will be spending the vast majority of next season with the under-21s. But he\u2019s certainly making a case to be the fourth-choice striker, and he\u2019s responded brilliantly to recent claims from Piroe that the teenager still has a lot of improving to do.<\/p>\n

Speaking constructively about the teen, Piroe said Gray needs to improve a lot: \u201cI think he [Gray] still needs to improve a lot, but he\u2019s showing he\u2019s doing really well and I\u2019m happy for him that he gets a chance as well to have a taste of what it feels like to be on the pitch, to be in and around the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just hope for him that he gets even more hungry from it as well, that he wants more and tries to keep developing.\u201d<\/p>\n

MORE LEEDS UNITED STORIES<\/p>\n

Patrick Bamford is also a huge fan of Harry Gray at Leeds United<\/p>\n

Starting the season with a brace and a win for the under-21s will certainly shine Gray in a positive light.<\/p>\n

For Farke, with Calvert-Lewin, Piroe and Nmecha as his first-team striker options now, he may well look to sign another one in what\u2019s left of the transfer window, or he may well look to someone like Gray to make the step up and be there when called upon.<\/p>\n

And it may well be that Gray features regularly in matchday squads, especially given Calvert-Lewin\u2019s unreliable injury record. And Piroe isn\u2019t the only one who has spoken about Gray recently.<\/p>\n

Earlier in the summer, Bamford gave his verdict on Gray at Leeds United<\/a>, and he could not have given the teenager a more positive review. Bamford said: \u201cHe could be top. He\u2019s tall, quite slim, quick, very aggressive. For how tall he is, his dribbling is a joke.\u201d<\/p>\n

To earn such praise from such a well-liked and proven striker as Bamford suggests that Gray really has potential.<\/p>\n

If he can take his chance when it comes this season, as it likely will, then Gray could quickly cement his place in the first-team picture, and quickly start to fulfil his huge potential.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Leeds United under-21s got off to a winning start in the Premier League 2 on Friday night, dumping…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":349731,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8814],"tags":[748,393,4884,30594,12413,1860,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-349730","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-harry-gray","12":"tag-joel-piroe","13":"tag-leeds","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349730","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=349730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349731"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}