Jesse Marsch will be hoping to see Leeds United ‘iron out’ a few issues on Wednesday evening as his side take on AS Monaco. That’s according to assistant coach Rene Maric, who insists the Whites’ are progressing well as they continue to prepare for the Premier League restart next week.
It’s been five and a half weeks since Leeds’ last competitive fixture and Marsch has been keen to use the World Cup break to make some necessary improvements within his team. As such, after giving players some much-needed respite, the club took the squad to Spain for a warm weather training camp earlier this month and organised three friendlies to be played in the build-up to their return to action.
Wins have come against La Liga sides Elche and Real Sociedad so far and while the visit of Monaco will provide another stern challenge, the coaching staff will be keen to see more progress made as the clash against Manchester City looms on the horizon.
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“I think that the preparation is going good,” Maric said after Friday night’s win over Sociedad. “But, we are basically in the middle of it, so we're halfway there.
“I think that there's things that we have to improve for the Monaco game, for sure we have things for the Monaco game that we have to iron out for Man City. Obviously Monaco and Man City are different teams so it's not always 100 percent that you can go linear, step by step, but you focus on different aspects and different phases of the pre-season. I think we're on a good path.”
Marsch named something close to his strongest available XI on Friday night and he is expected to do the same against the French outfit, who currently sit sixth in Ligue 1 and have a knockout Europa League tie to look forward to in the New Year. As such, Brenden Aaronson and Rasmus Kristensen are expected to get more minutes following their World Cup efforts and Tyler Adams might even get a run out.
Adams, who is suspended for the Man City game, didn’t feature against Sociedad after captaining the USA in Qatar, and while his game time will be managed, he could be in contention on Wednesday night.
“They came from the World Cup and every single one of them played different minutes at the World Cup,” Maric said when explaining the differences in approach regarding Leeds’ returning internationals. “Obviously Tyler is suspended for the Man City game so it was just the thought process individually how they react to the training after coming back from the World Cup and having a break between the World Cup and now.
“We decided together how much every single one of them shall play and then that's what he settled for because I think it's a mixture of getting them back into the shape but also, again, the whole group is important. We will need the whole group and just that everyone is able to get minutes and to play with them that style against such an opponent.”
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