Ambitious new owner and bright young manager has Elland Road fans dreaming of top-flight return
EXCLUSIVE WHISPER it quietly, but some semblance of normality could be returning to the basket case Championship club which is Leeds United.
Under previous madcap Italian owner Massimo Cellino, managers were on football’s equivalent of death row - seven came and went in three-and-ahalf chaotic years.
Brian Clough’s infamous 44 days at Elland Road were a breeze compared to the tempestuous Cellino reign.
It was football’s very own hokey-cokey. In and out went Brian McDermott, David Hockaday, plucked from nonLeague football, Slovenian Darko Milanic, Uwe Rosler, Neil Redfearn, Steve Evans and shortly after Cellino’s celebrated departure, Garry Monk. This was ‘The Damned United’ with an X-certificate rating – managerial sackings, FA bans for the owner, legal battles, fans protests.
No wonder Cellino (below) told his one time co-owner and now sole Leeds United guardian Andrea Radrizzani on handing over the keys of the club: “If you could survive working with me you can survive anything.”
But with Italian media rights mogul Radrizzani at the helm, former Barcelona B player Thomas Christiansen, 44, appointed as head coach and new signings rolling in, the frustrated fans are back on side.
More than 18,000 season tickets have been sold – 25 per cent up on last term.
But crucial to the club’s future, Radrizzani paid around £20million to buy back Elland Road. United had been paying an annual rent of £1.7m to play there. He is also looking to build a new training ground in the centre of the city.
It has breathed new life into the Leeds fans – some of whom witnessed the Don Revie glory years, Howard Wilkinson becoming the last English manager to win the League in 1992 and since 2004 trailing around the Championship and for three grim seasons a place in football’s third tier.
They will travel to Bolton today with renewed hope and expectation.
Leeds legend Eddie Gray, who watches the club home and away, said: “I do feel there is more stability at the football club now.
“Buying the ground back was a big statement.
“The most important thing, though, about any football club is what happens on the pitch. To be successful you need good players. I just hope the recruitment has been good and we move on in the right direction.
“Leeds have sold more season tickets this summer than for a long, long time.
“That guarantees you’re up in the high 20,000s to 30,000 nearly every home game