Michael Skubala was keeping his cards close to his chest when asked if anymore of his Leeds United U21s players could leave on loan this month. The Whites have already allowed players to leave in the January transfer window, but it remains to be seen whether more players will be sent elsewhere in pursuit of minutes.
Alfie McCalmont joined Carlisle United last week until the end of the campaign and Leo Hjelde followed him out to the door to Championship side Rotherham United. However, more players have been linked away from Elland Road, with Max Dean being the latest.
A move to MK Dons to link up with former Leeds U21s boss Mark Jackson has been touted for the striker, but Skubala refused to give anything away regarding the immediate future of Dean or any other members of his squad.
Read more: Leeds United U21s player ratings as Darko Gyabi impresses in West Brom defeat
“I think with all these players it's making sure that they have the right journey,” Skubala said. “I think our decision as a club, Victor, Adam, Jesse, whatever we think is right for the players in their journey.
“Yeah, the window’s open, as everybody knows, and things can happen last minute and things can happen in a day. There's nothing planned. But you never know.
On Dean, who didn’t feature in Monday’s 2-1 loss to West Brom, he said: “He was unavailable tonight. There’s nothing I know about it at the minute but we need to protect him and look after him and whatever decisions go with the club.”
The Whites missed the opportunity to climb back to the top of the Premier League 2 Division 2 table against the Baggies, as they fell to their second straight league defeat. Leeds had plenty of chances at the LNER Community Stadium in York and were the better side for a majority of the contest, but they fell behind to a controversial penalty in the second half, scored by Rayhaan Tulloch.
Darko Gyabi hit back with a fine effort to level the scores, but United, who were reduced to 10-men following Kris Moore’s sending off, caved in injury time as Rico Richards broke free to bag the winner. Having gone through the first half of the season unbeaten, Skubala hopes his side can now respond to a new type of adversity.
“We've talked about it before we had these two defeats,” he added. “I think it's the different style that teams are playing against us.
“One of the challenges you find with young groups is how they weather the storms. If we just went with 21 year olds and did what other teams are doing, you might not have a good development programme but you might have a stronger team of older players.
"So the challenge you have with the young players in their development cycle is they can be good players, but how do they actually learn to manage the moments in the game and what you see at the minute is some of the times we just don't manage the moments well enough. It's going to be a different challenge.
“I think to the run in is going to be difficult when I think everybody thought that ‘oh, it's going to be easy’. There’s no easy league to win because even if you get your noses in front, which we have, there's still people chasing ism, trying to stop it as and I think it's going to be a really tough run.”
Archie Gray was a spectator in York and after several months on the sidelines through injury, Skubala is pleased to have him on the comeback trail: “He’s still coming back to fitness. I don’t think he’s too far away now and again, if you talk about reinforcements, he’ll come into our group to get minutes and starts. That’s looking good.”
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