‘Wow’, ‘Get him in the first-team’, ‘Messi regen’ – Many Leeds fans in awe of ‘unreal’ U23 ace
Leeds United Under-23s beat Crystal Palace 4-1 on Sunday and fans were massively impressed with summer signing Joe Gelhardt.
Leeds signed the player from Wigan in the summer after he’d broken into their senior side.
They paid close to £1m for him but the consensus was that they’d underpaid, with Peterborough owner Darrah MacAnthony saying at the time, “This justifies my advocation for an EFL ‘Football Person’ to be placed at clubs in admin so that assets aren’t snapped up for below market value. This kid is worth more imo & fair play to Leeds getting this deal. But to cheap imo if true.”
£1m is a lot for an Under-23s player but Leeds obviously have a plan for Gelhardt and his displays so far have proved that he can’t be far away from the senior squad.
After another summer signing – Cody Drameh – gave Leeds the lead on Sunday, Gelhardt scored his first of the afternoon shortly before half-time from the penalty spot.
But it was his second that really turned heads.
He picked up the ball around 25 yards out and took the ball around three Palace players before shooting into the bottom corner of the net,
It was a stunning goal and it shows that Gelhardt is definitely a name to watch in the future. Maybe the not so distant future.
Gelhardt has drawn comparisons with Wayne Rooney before and one Leeds fan mentioned it on Sunday saying, “Is it me or has he a young Rooney look about him? Looks a tremendous talent.”
Others were saying that he is first-team bound with the only question being one of timing. One fan said he “will be first team next season”.
We can definitely see him making the bench before that.
Here are the best reactions from Leeds fans…
https://twitter.com/benji_coops/status/1322908143056277506
https://twitter.com/dodwell_dave/status/1322907504578318337
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