Patrick Bamford has become the story of the week at Leeds United. First, there was the potentially season-defining penalty miss on Saturday and then the abhorrent death threats which prompted a statement from the club.
In truth, Bamford’s been one of the stories that’s run and run for the past two seasons. The recent, last-gasp, back-post miss against Leicester City was a recent new chapter and then Saturday’s Nick Pope save only compounded the debate around his role in this run-in.
Bamford may well be out of form, suffering from a lack of confidence and feeling his way through the dark for that 2020/21 form, but there is no way relegation could be plonked at his door. These consecutive campaigns of woe stretch from the top of the club, through the boardroom, coaching staff and first-team players.
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Leeds win and lose as a team. And yet, as has been the case with Illan Meslier, Sam Allardyce cannot ignore what’s going on in front of his face. He can see he has a striker struggling for confidence, but will he pull him out of the firing line like his goalkeeper?
Given the adversity stacking up at Bamford’s door during last weekend’s draw in the aftermath of the penalty save, Allardyce had the opportunity, if he wanted one, to hook the number nine. Nobody would have batted an eyelid if the team had returned for the second half without their centre forward.
People would have understood, but Allardyce stood by his man and was only forced to take him off in the latter stages as he plugged the gap left by a dismissed Junior Firpo. The same decision now falls to Allardyce ahead of the trip to West Ham United.
“He was good today,” he said on Saturday. “He held the ball up, he caused them a few problems. He got the cross in for the goal. We were doing okay with him.
“Hopefully, like everybody needs to do, we need to get a little bit better next week and better again. He scores goals when he gets a chance and we need goal scorers on the pitch and I don’t think we've got that many.”
Bamford remains one of the few players in this Leeds squad Allardyce feels can provide that goal which might keep them in the league. That confidence, it seems, is only being rebuilt on the pitch, where the number nine can prove each and every one of his detractors wrong.
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