Bielsa was more box office in battle of the A-listers
Britain’s best columnist at Goodison Park
THEY might still get involved in a relegation struggle, they might yet find the demands of their coach a little too tough.
But Marcelo Bielsa’s Leeds United are box office.
If BT Sport are looking for options other than Liverpool for their prime time slot, try Leeds.
This is a team worth watching. And as they presently sit in 11th place and have the tools to slice the best apart, there should not be an issue at the wrong end of the table.
But after Raphinha’s beauty had given them a fourth Premier League win of the season, it was hard not to wonder how much more comfortable this should have been.
And if they repeat performances as fluent as this one, the goals and results will surely flow. To those of a certain vintage, the expected goals statistics are a little baffling but you suspect Leeds must stand fairly high in those rankings.
Their app roach play, masterminded by Bielsa and often coordinated by the excellent Kalvin Phillips, is generally a thing of beauty. They can unlock defences with the speed and crispness of their passing, as they did frequently at Goodison Park.
But even for a team of such panache, of such diligence, of such imagination, games will be lost if opportunities continue to be spurned.
They were forming an orderly
queue to miss them in the first half of this contest.
Jack Harrison was at the front of that queue, guiding a golden one wide and heading another against the post.
There is a precision about everything Leeds do when going forward, apart from in front of goal.
But while Patrick Bamford’s early failure from a few yards looked bad, credit had to go to Jordan Pickford and a save with the feet right out of the David de Gea textbook.
Pickford has had an eventful season, to say the least.
In fact, it is rare he does not have, in one way or another, an eventful match.
You can certainly hear him. When Everton welcome back 2,000 of their fans, they still won’t make as much noise as Pickford. His call to insist a particular cross was the keeper’s ball was that loud, I ducked.
But he remains a very accomplished shot-stopper and suggestions he might lose his international berth are premature.
You could say he kept Everton in this game for a long period but that would ignore the home team’s own profligacy. Bielsa’s team can Abdoulaye Doucoure unlock defences
with the speed and Mason Holgate
of their passing wasted nice openings and a sublime James Rodriguez effort was ruled out by the narrowest of offside calls, which was ratified by those lines of VAR.
The call was correct and everyone simply got on with life, just as they should be doing throughout the Premier League.
VAR is getting increasingly vilified because VAR is getting things increasingly right.
That is the bottom line.
And the linesman did not need VAR to see that Ezgjan Alioski had been offside in the build-up to Bamford’s tap-in.
It was at that point it looked as though Leeds’s wastefulness would be costly, but Raphinha’s individual brilliance gave them the rewards they deserved.
And so one celebrated coach was markedly happier than another.
Carlo Ancelotti’s early- season bullishness has been tempered by a
RAP STAR Raphinha’s late strike secures three points for Leeds run of six Premier League games that has produced just one win.
With key defensive injuries, they looked unbalanced and their talisman in the opening months, Rodriguez, found it all a bit too sharp.
Perhaps, Farhad Moshiri’s money has still not bought Ancelotti the depth of squad he needs.
What will be particularly disappointing was the way they failed to respond to any half-time alterations, instructions or encouragement.
They were always half a step – in deed and thought – behind Leeds.
After that fine start to the season, Everton and Ancelotti were widely touted as possible top-six interlopers.
On this evidence, if anyone is doing any interloping, it is more likely to be Leeds and Bielsa.