Pressekonferansen.
Jeg må si jeg koser meg med å få tilgang til de detaljerte svarene til Bielsa, de forskjellige spillerne også for så vidt
13:29
He's here
First question coming up...
13:33
Take positives from Saturday?It’s not a responsibility of the players. It’s a decision I took, and a wrong decision. The reality of the game indicated to me I did not take the right decision. I knew we had two options.
The possibility of building a line of three with Bill Ayling or Phillips. I decided to build the line of three with Phillips, making him do movements forward and backwards. Two possibilities of being in front of Cooper and Jansson or behind.
With this system I could keep all of the good things from the Preston game. Samu and Klich attacked well from the centre to the sides and Phillips started the game well as a four. I wanted to keep all of these positive features of the team.
When we didn’t have the ball I wanted to build with a line of three and with the ball a four, but it didn’t work. This was a mistake. I thought it would work, but it didn’t. That’s why the players are not responsible and I will try not to make any mistakes.
13:34
Learn about the players from defeat?We had a problem. We had two goals we conceded. We couldn’t change the situation. What we did was not enough. In spite of this I think we didn’t deserve to lose, I even think we deserved to win. We didn’t play well, it was very hard to play well. These are my conclusions.
13:35
Next challenge to respond to defeat?Whenever you lose you always want to win. If it’s a derby the willpower to win increases.
13:38
Spoken to players about mentality after last year's decline?It’s very difficult to make any comparison because I was not here last year. IO know what happened last year, I know what you are trying to underline, I know it’s a derby, but I don’t think it’s good to compare both situations. The good idea is to resolve this situation right now.
It’s difficult to make comparison like the one you suggest. It’s not the best thing to predict you are going to have storms. We always try to be consciously optimistic and we have solid arguments to build optimism.
We’ll have to show that next Friday.
13:40
Forshaw - ready to start?Yes, Adam is a player ready to play. There is a difficulty he has to solve. This difficulty he can only solve by playing. Before getting injured he was the best player in the team. He was the best because he had six pre-season games to be fit. He has not played in the last month-and-a-half. He’s physical performance is top(?). The real proof is during the game and the challenges of that. Now we are in this process, but he’s ready to play if we need him.
13:41
InjuriesBamford and Brown won’t be with us for a long time. Roofe is close to the first team, not immediately, but he’s close. Berardi and Pablo also are close to the first team, not as close as Roofe.
Shaughnessy it will be a little longer. Shackleton is already in the first team.
13:41
Changes?I won’t change any player.
13:43
What have players shown in training?You don’t react in the same way after a win than after a loss. After the game we lost, we asked some questions together. We built our conclusions together. We have had so far two training session where each player can express himself.
The conclusions are positive ones and I have a lot of hope for Friday’s game. I don’t know if I answered your question.
13:43
Enjoy seeing them express themselves?I am happy with that. Maybe I don’t understand the question. There is only one possible answer to the question. How could something positive make me sad?
13:45
Sheffield Wednesday - thoughts?I couldn’t tell you. I think it’s a team that has many possibilities tactically. The differences are not linked to their defence only. Also have different possibilities for attacking midfielders and strikers.
13:47
How to combat their strengths?They have many offensive players with different features. They played all of them. Number nine and 17 in the axis, 45, 19, 37, 20, these are many offensive players. They combine together in different ways and play in different positions. We have to adapt to how they play and how they position themselves.
13:47
How to combat their strengths?They have many offensive players with different features. They played all of them. Number nine and 17 in the axis, 45, 19, 37, 20, these are many offensive players. They combine together in different ways and play in different positions. We have to adapt to how they play and how they position themselves.
13:50
Birmingham's low block being copied?Apart from the style we chose we have many teams in the Championship who play like that. Half of the games so far had these features. I honestly think we have all the ingredients to play against these teams. It;s something common and frequent to attack in small, reduced spaces. When you have a team that defends in its own half you have small spaces and when you have small spaces the offensive players don’t make movements to free themselves. When you have free spaces the natural movement is to take the free space.
When you have many bodies in the small space the trend is close and ask for the ball. This is the worse thing you can do because if you do that we already have small spaces and if we do that, these spaces become even smaller. This is the difficulty created by the opponent. We know what we have to do to solve this kind of problem. The first step is knowing what to do, the second is doing it and the third is doing it well. You have to imagine what would happen if both teams played the same way. What kind of spectacle would you have?
13:58
Braver passing?It’s not about daring to do something because the only thing to do is that because if you don’t, you just stop playing. If you don’t make passes, the only thing is to play long balls and give the ball back to the opponent.
What you are talking about, the system of playing against small spaces, if we play like that the only solution is to wait for the opponent’s mistake, the one playing behind the line in his own half. The opponent is waiting for your mistakes. It’s a legitimate process (confused sentences here). When they try to lead the other team to make a mistake and with that mistake, they want to try to take advantage of the mistakes made the team that wants to play. They want to counter into the wide open spaces.
You have two paths - either you risk playing and make a mistake because when you play it’s implicit you can make a mistake. The other path is you don’t play. This is a possibility too. Just imagine a game where both teams do not want to play. If the last game lasted 15 minutes, if we did exactly the same, we would play only 25 minutes out of 90.
This is among the rules. The rules allow you to do that, but this is not the spirit of the game. I assume my position regarding this problem. My position is to try to reach the beauty of the game. It’s a lot more difficult to reach the beauty when only one team wants to play. Please don’t understand what I’m saying that the fact of reducing spaces and not playing, if you do this, the rules allow you. I’m not complaining about that. I’m just talking about the difficulties we faced. The fans who are the centre of our activity is obviously in love with the result. We should know, also, this link with the result, we should ask ourselves if the fans are ready to put, as a priority, the game.
We could ask, for example, to the fans of Leeds, what they would have preferred: us to lose as we lost trying to overcome the opponent, even if we couldn’t play well, and assuming all difficulties we faced, or would the fans have preferred we draw the game without playing because if we hadn’t played, we cou;d have got one point.
We have to point out these aspects.
14:02
Phillips - difficult being withdrawn early twiceI decided to substitute Kalvin. This does not draw the portrait of Kalv, it draws my own. If you deeply analyse the decision I took you will say I corrected a mistake I made. For me, it’s a very difficult situation for two reasons. The last thing I want is to hurt a player as noble as Phillips because he’s very generous. I can’t make the same mistake again. If I think the game is not well designed and I don’t take a solution, I make a double mistake because the first mistake is I made a mistake and I wouldn’t dare to correct the mistake. I take the decisions I think are the best ones.
We could say ‘poor Phillips’ but the people who understand football say ‘what a bad decision Bielsa took because he has to change after 30 minutes a decision he took.’
When I didn’t substitute Phillips, he didn’t make any mistake. BY making the change I made the mistake.
14:10
Peacock-FarrellHe made a mistake in the first goal. This is in evidence. In the eight games before he played better than he played against Birmingham.
14:10
Derbies in ArgentinaWhat I saw in Argentina, the emotions when training, I can’t have the same emotions here.
14:12
Where does Championship rank for him globally?It’s a beautiful competition. Football starts with the fans and with the stadiums. Football is also about the passion the fans feel about it and then you have the game, the beauty of the game, the spectacle you offer to the fans.
Here in England the passion is on a high level and the spectacle, the beauty is sometimes good, sometimes bad as in all leagues around the world.
14:15
Forshaw - unique qualities?Forshaw can play as Klich and Klich can play as Forshaw does. Klich is a complete player, he can play in each level of the pitch, in defence he attacks, he can play in the axis and in the sides.
Forshaw is the same kind of player. He’s very dynamic, he’s flexible. When he has to build offensive responses he is as implicated as when he has to build defensive ones. Their physical capacity are very important. They are not players that can make a difference by themselves. They make the difference associated with their team-mates. They can’t do what Samu Saiz does, the only player who can do what he does is himself.
They all midfielders, but Forshaw and Klich are different to Saiz.
14:17
Always protect your players no matter what?I think I gave some strong arguments to explain why I was responsible and you’re asking me a question, I’m not talking about your intention, I don’t deserve to be asked this and I’m going to explain why.
When the head coach says he’s responsible and doesn’t give arguments, what they are saying is the real responsibility is the players. Because if you don’t explain why the people who listen to this say it’s not the head coach, it’s the players’ fault.
I reject this kind of practise. That’s why I am surprised. I gave arguments why I was responsible. I don’t know if the arguments are right or wrong, but they are solid. You have substance in the argument.
14:20
Always protect his players, not Birmingham...I never say something if I cannot give arguments for it because otherwise people would suspect me. Whenever I say something I try to give arguments and when I say something, I am saying what I think. I don’t say what is good to say, but there’s something I should honestly tell you. You cannot be a leader if you don’t assume, publicly, the responsibility. You can’t be a leader if you say the responsibility is the team’s.
14:21
Alioski up next...
Here’s the Macedonian.
14:22
Response to defeatIt’s my second year now. We see a difference, but the players are all the same. The coach changes many things here. We work really hard. All players here are different, not only me.
14:22
Given confidence?The confidence is here. All players must believe under Bielsa. We believe. We work hard and do all the things we want to go up and, of course, we believe.
14:23
Responsibility for the defeat - he took itNobody thinks the coach will say this, but this is good for the players, they like this. We know, as players, we were not very good. The coach trusts us and he does something he thinks he sees is good, but maybe it’s not like this.
14:24
Different to other coaches?Each coach has a philosophy. Everyone different, but Bielsa is different with how the staff work when he’s not here, on the pitch around the building. Each player is happy he’s here because we can learn many things from him. I hope with the new things we learn we can stay where we are.
14:25
Ever F***er?I lose weight and fat. Not only me. At the beginning you think it’s not important, but you see from how much we run how fit we are.
14:25
Earn a starting spot with high level?It’s better you don’t think about it. You work hard and then see if you’re in the team or not.
14:27
How pleased personally over the season?We started good. I am happy. I do always give 100 per cent. I helped my team with my performances if I work hard. I will always be better. I learn every day. Hardest games and we must show character and always be on the straight. We must always work harder and play good.
14:27
Where can he improveI can improve in the attack and be more aggressive. We train good with the tactic. Automatically I help in defence. I can do more in attack. It will come.
14:28
Enjoy the left?It’s not the first time I play left. It’s my side. The difference is I can come in and shoot with my right boot. On the left you can do all of the work. It’s not a big difference. It’s new for me to always be on the left.
14:29
Jack Harrison thoughtsI like him. He is a very good player. Good technique. Quickly in this team, inside, he do very, very well. Also a good person, not only because he play. He works hard and you see this on the pitch. I hope he will help us in hard times.
14:30
Bielsa reaction to BirminghamBetter not to lose with Bielsa as a coach. He hates this. He believes in us. He tells us what was not good. How he says this is different. We know now next time we lose we have a hard week. Sometimes you lose, but good to have a coach who hates losing.
14:31
Derby matchesI enjoy all games. It’s a derby. We go for victory, it’s Sheffield and next it’s Hull. We are a big team and they are scared. Not easy for us to play against the teams we will play. Nice for the supporters down there. We want to show a good performance.
14:32
Birmingham problems?The press we wanted to do, the aggression we normally have, was not there from the beginning. We lose the aggression, the press we normally do. First half we didn’t have it. It was not easy from 2-0 down to come back, but we know which mistakes we made and we are prepared for the next time.
14:32
Dressing room frustration?Each player was frustrated. Good when each player thinks it’s bad we lose. We know what was wrong and we know the mistakes we made. The players know which mistakes we made in the game.
14:34
Important to respond immediately?We win on Friday, but it’s not easy. They know how strong we are. We play the best football and we show this always in the games.
14:35
Stopping the rot of last year's run of defeatsLast year when we won we were lucky sometimes, but this year we are winning by more. I am sure we cannot lose more than two games in a row because we are so prepared. These coaches prepare us really well. When we don’t play very well we bring a reaction. Like after Swansea. Norwich was unbelievable. Coaches told us the mistakes and each player is focused to respond.
14:35
Stronger mentality this year?Yes. The mentality was not like it is now after five or six games. Last season we would worry, but after we beat Stoke we had the mentality we are really strong. The staff, how they speak with us, this mentality changed for all players.
14:37
Same players as last yearLast year we have many players with old mentality, but this year is a new year with a new coach.
14:38
We are done after more than an hour...
And I’m off for a sit down.
Beren Cross
https://www.leeds-live.co.uk/sport/leeds-united/leeds-united-marcelo-bielsa-press-15202402