Drameh dilemma
The Cody Drameh narrative is not going away quietly for Leeds United. Once again the 21-year-old was consigned to the bench and once again he impressed when he eventually took to the field on Friday night.
The Whites do not have better competition for places anywhere in their squad than at right-back currently. Rasmus Kristensen has been here five minutes after an eight-figure transfer fee, Luke Ayling is a promotion hero and vice-captain, while Drameh could go on to be one of the best full-backs in the country.
The pecking order would seem to suggest it is Drameh who will be leaving the club next month in search of more opportunities. It remains to be seen whether that will be permanently or on loan, but the latter would leave him with one year on his Leeds contract in the summer.
READ MORE: Leeds United deliver squad injury update after Jack Harrison omission as Man City clash nears
It would be unwise to allow an asset of Drameh’s potential to enter the final year of his contract because of the crash the club would see in his transfer value. A new contract would protect that value, but it seems highly unlikely he would sign anything with so little proof Leeds will give him playing time.
These performances in matches and in training are only making life harder for Marsch and Victor Orta when the chips are down in January. Real Sociedad barely stretched Leeds in the second half of the game, but Drameh looked attentive, switched on and combative throughout his 45-minute outing.
His attacking play may develop with time, but even at 21, his defensive work, one vs one especially, has been consistently impressive.
Klich’s dichotomy
For someone supposedly unable to convince Jesse Marsch he’s worth more than 18-minute substitute run-outs and reportedly set for Major League Soccer, it was odd to see Mateusz Klich play 90 minutes. If the Pole is virtually redundant as a meaningful option for the head coach in this squad, why was he given every second of a game designed to inform future, competitive decisions for this system?
For what it’s worth, Klich was steady enough without the touch of class which laced the edges of last week’s Elche turn. There’s the sentimental angle Marsch may have been tugging at, but that can be done with 15 minutes against Monaco if it’s a farewell they want.
Ten senior names were absent from the matchday squad, so it’s understandable Marsch was lacking in some departments, but Joe Gelhardt and Sam Greenwood are each expected to be at Leeds longer than Klich. Could they not have been used?
It’s not playing Klich is a bad thing. On the contrary, he’s proven time after time how impressive he is. It’s more the jarring correlation of increased minutes with increased exit noise.
A new shape
While we are being taught more and more how little formations matter, how fluid they are and how systems are never one thing for more than a few minutes at a time, everyone could see the change in Leeds last night. However players might have moved on or off the ball, that was a shift from Marsch’s usual 4-2-3-1 to a 4-3-3 against Real Sociedad.
Rene Maric was not reading too much into it after the game. He reiterated how shapes change to expose opposition weaknesses and last night just happened to be more of a 4-3-3.
Klich would drop off from his expected number 10 berth and play as an eight on the right of Adam Forshaw and Marc Roca in a three. There was also a false nine slot for Brenden Aaronson at the centre of the attack.
Rodrigo ploughed a narrow furrow down the right channel. It will be worth monitoring to see if this is a dedicated system Marsch wants to commit to moving forward.
World Cup returners
Kristensen, Aaronson and Tyler Adams were all expected to return to training this week, but the assumption had been they may get a little more time to sharpen up before returning to match action. In hindsight, Marsch only had last night and Monaco on Wednesday to play with, publicly at least, before Manchester City arrive, so perhaps the internationals’ returns should not have surprised anyone.
Adams, suspended for City of course, was spotted in the stands, but the other two got 45 minutes under their belts. While the USA captain had a full 360 minutes in Qatar, last playing on December 3, Aaronson had less than a third of that and clearly would not have been exhausted by such a schedule.
The Dane would see 224 minutes with his country, but last played on November 30, giving him ample time to rest and recover before last night’s return.
Injuries continue to dominate the agenda
Ten absentees, not all through injury, was the final headcount once Jack Harrison decided not to risk some warm-up tightness at Elland Road. It’s the storyline which never seems to end at Leeds.
When you breakdown who was missing, and why, it can paint a slightly rosier picture for when the real stuff starts up again. Illan Meslier has glandular fever and his recovery time really does come down to how his body is fighting the virus.
Adams and Harrison, we are led to believe, are not injured. While Luis Sinisterra and Stuart Dallas’s long-term recoveries are well known.
Maric said Diego Llorente was the player he was most confident about returning for City, which leaves Junior Firpo, Robin Koch, Patrick Bamford and Crysencio Summerville. Firpo was fit enough to fly out to Spain for the training camp and work in the gym over there.
Koch was fit enough to train lightly on the morning of the Elche game before backing out to avoid taking any risks. Bamford’s surgery was not expected to rule him out of training for long, while Summerville is another Maric was hopeful about for City.
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