It’d take a brave person to suggest that Marcelo Bielsa won’t finish the season at Leeds United given the tremendous start he’s made. However, it’s an entirely plausible situation.
You really can’t fault the Argentine for how he’s gone about things already this term. At the rate Leeds are going, his team finally look like they’re going to mount a successful promotion challenge, and they deserve it. Bielsa has instilled a sense of pride and battle back into the squad, who were languishing without hope under their previous managers. And the players have totally bought into his regime – giving it their all in every game.
But is this looking at things through rose tinted glasses?
Here are two reasons why it’s possible Bielsa won’t be the manager come the end of the 18/19 season…
Bielsa Burnout
The Bielsa burnout is a real and recognised concern.
Ander Herrara, who played under Bielsa at Athletic Bilbao, discussed his own experience of the burnout towards the end of the 11/12 season claiming in a podcast interview: “I can’t lie to you, in the last months we couldn’t even move. We had five games to play in the league and were in two cup finals and I think we lost all of them. [They lost three in the league, drew one and won one].”
“Our legs said ‘stop’,” he continued. “We used to play always with the same players and were not at our best in the finals. We were a completely different team than we had been before because, to be honest, we were physically f*cked.”
Indeed, we’re all aware of the rigorous training procedures he’s had his men going through in West Yorkshire to drag them up to the required standard, and we’ve seen the damage it’s done to the first-team already with a number of key players missing games.
If results do happen to dip due to physical fatigue the board may be forced to bring someone else in to rescue Leeds’ season…
Abandon ship
Bielsa has been known to make some rash decisions in the past which have led to either his own resignation or sacking.
Quite recently he left his post at Marseille due to a disagreement with the board over the management of the club,
Indeed, it was fairly recently that he left his post at Marseille, due to a disagreement with the board, and followed it up with a disastrous two day spell at Lazio prompting a €50 million lawsuit.
Bielsa’s stint at Lille wouldn’t prove to be much better either. After 13 games in charge, Lille announced that they had suspended their manager, who had apparently told a number of experienced first-team players that they were no longer wanted at the club. One month later he was sacked.
