Jesse, the best and the worst of Leeds United, how would you sum up today?
I'd say we've encapsulated our 16-game season in one match. Moments that were really good and really on top of things and in control and then moments where we're vulnerable and make easy mistakes that at this level you can't make because you get punished.
So obviously, I always try to look at the positives and I really like a lot of the things that that we're able to accomplish and certainly the men in the team. But it's just a lot of moments when we're in control of matches we can't seem to stay on top of the match. But in the second half at 2-2, we were really good, really good.
The reason we got the lead up to go to 3-2 was because we were on top of the match. Right now we give leads up so quickly, whether it's Bournemouth 1-0, whether it's Liverpool, 1-0, every time that we got the lead today we found a way to give it up so we've got to find a way to be more stable defensively and now handle moments in matches.
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At 3-2 you’re back in control of the scoreline and you make a change and it looked more vulnerable after that, what happened there? What went wrong?
Well, we make a mistake almost right away. We know that they're going to push, we know that they're going to spread the backline out and put more numbers along the backline so then we decide to go 5-4-1 which we've done a lot and we've been stable in those moments. But then a ball comes in the box and we headed down right to Hojbjerg at the top of the box and we're not closing from the other side. I mean, for me, that's not about tactics, that's about giving it to the opponent at the wrong moment. So that was hard to swallow at that moment that we that we gave the game away.
There was a bit of controversy but what was your take on Harry Kane’s goal?
That's a foul, it’s a foul.
Has anything been said to you about that?
The fourth official says to me, ‘yeah, I think it's a foul’. I go ‘okay, good, it's going to go to VAR’ and then they don't, they don't even look at it.
But again, I mean, what am I going to do freak out like I did in Brentford? I mean, then they're going throw me out and I'm going be the guy who's in the wrong, which is incredible, right? What's in the wrong is that it's not a foul.
By the way, they told us at the beginning of the year, also that for our third goal, they were going to go so far back and I'm not even sure that's a foul but they said they're not going to go far back in in moments to re-referee.
Obviously you’ve got to cope without Tyler Adams on the other side of the World Cup break now after his dismissal. Going into the break that’s one thing to consider, what’s your thoughts now?
My thoughts are that we have a good team and that we're improving in matches and that we're finding ways to be good for more stretches in matches. But when we have lapses tactically and with behaviours, we are vulnerable. In the end, we're still fighting to make sure that guys are on top of principles at all times, when they're tired, when the opponent is good, when we stick to our principles, and when we stick to our tactics, we control matches, I don't care who it's against. So obviously coming out of the break, a big focus, will be about finding ways to win matches that we're on top of and not give them away. And then it's a huge test against Man City at home coming out of the break. So it won't be easy, will be a tough start to coming out of the break, but we've got to recharge and find a way to get better.
Spurs caught you on your left a lot, was that a concern at the break?
We pressed them to our right and then one of the things they tried to go do is go right to left, left to right. Because we weren't closing our team, especially in the six position, it meant that Coops had to step out with Harry Kane more which we didn't want to do and that opened up a combination that got them out to our left side.
We tried to make that adjustment at half-time is one of the reasons we went 4-3-3 instead of 4-2-3-1. But then, again, it comes down to lapses in tactical concentration when we when we're vulnerable and we can't have that, we can't have that.
Do you think fatigue played any part in the last stages?
No, I think inability to execute.
Willy Gnonto, is he OK?
Yeah, it was partly the tactical change, we felt like we wanted to go to more 4-3-3 instead of 4-2-3-1.
When you saw those warning shots from Kulusevski, he was clearly going more and more into the game those last 10-15 minutes, what were you trying to do is try and solve that?
Yes, by playing 5-4-1. What we can do is now double down on the wing and still have numbers in the box. So it's too easy to get crosses in the box and then it's not good enough defending in the box.
This is what we've seen from us, right? We give up too many moments where we don't defend the wing aggressive enough and we give the opponent too much space. Then we don't defend in the box well enough. And again, when we go 5-4-1, the reason we do that is to specifically take care of that problem.
Lapses and mistakes, how do you make a difference to that?
We have to stay on top of the discipline to end the behaviours and continue to reiterate what we need and what it needs to look like and, not that we do it 90% of the time, but that we do it 100% of the time. That is the key. That is the key.
Are you tempted to alter things with the defence structurally?
Well, we do all the time. Today we play 4-2-3-1, we played 4-3-3, we played 5-4-1 and it's always about trying to take what the opponent is trying to do, but stick to our principles and then make sure that we're addressing what's necessary and also still being effective with what we want to do with the ball.
We've created more flexibility and more clarity and that's the reason why at 2-2 we're in control of the match, because tactically we were on top of things and then when it slips we tactically are not.
What sort of work do you have to do to double down on that concentration and that discipline?
Continue in training to emphasise the important elements. We've gotten better. We've gotten better, and it's a reason why we've been able to flip the script a little bit in our season. For me, a lot of times we just make mistakes that we shouldn't be making. And it stems often for me from the fact that we're not fully committing to, tactically and behaviourally, what we want to achieve.
Again, this is a process of trying to stay on top so that the players can, at all moments, understand how to handle everything, and we're getting closer, we're getting closer, but we still find ways to punish ourselves.
Is it too easy an excuse to say that this will happen with a young team?
No, but it's also a reality. We need to just continue to build the infrastructure of how we want to play and then continue to mature, to understand what the league is, what the best opponents are, It's why I say the game mimics the season, it's moments where we look really good and then it's moments where we look really vulnerable and it happens in over 90 minutes span and it happened over the last 16 matches.
Willy Gnonto got his first start today, what do you like about him?
In general, we really like Willy. I think his mentality to improve, his understanding of tactics, his intelligence, they're all at a really high level. So for a young player, he doesn't play like a young player which is great to see.
He was really effective coming from the bench against Bournemouth. I think he was also good in this match but when we looked at the fact that we needed to make some tactical changes, we thought that that made the most sense to take him off.
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