‘What a load of rubbish’ – Daniel Farke’s Dominic Calvert-Lewin claim rubbished at Leeds United
Troy Deeney has rubbished the praise being heaped on Dominic Calvert-Lewin over his excellent form for Leeds United.
Former Everton striker Calvert-Lewin has scored in each of Leeds past four matches to potentially save Daniel Farke’s job.
Farke was facing the sack heading into the visit of Chelsea, despite a rousing second-half comeback at Man City led by Calvert-Lewin’s introduction off the bench which ultimately fell short.
Instead the Englishman netted again as Chelsea were beaten 3-1, then a third consecutive in the dramatic 3-3 draw with Liverpool, and again as Leeds took a late point at Brentford last week.
His manager has been highly complementary, but Deeny isn’t having any of it.
Troy Deeney dismisses Calvert-Lewin praise from Farke
Speaking in his column for The Sun this week the former Watford captain pushed back on the Leeds striker being hailed, and highlighted the injury nightmares he battled through during the latter years of his career on Merseyside.
He said: “Daniel Farke said that Dominic Calvert-Lewin is one of the best English strikers around.
“What a damning indictment on English strikers. When I first heard it, I thought what a load of rubbish. But look at it and he doesn’t have much heavyweight competition.
“We all know Calvert-Lewin can be a very effective striker who’s had a terrible time with injuries. I don’t mean to be cruel but it feels like he is simply being praised for being fit at the moment.
“Only once in the past five seasons has he got beyond 30 games. So let’s focus on doing that again before we decide how good he is.”
Calvert-Lewin must keep up form for his sake and Farke’s
Calvert-Lewin isn’t the only reason Leeds are unbeaten in three heading into Saturday evening’s clash with Crystal Palace, but he has been leading from the front in the German’s revamped 3-5-2 set up.
The ex-Toffee’s start to life with the Whites was hugely underwhelming, with his nightmare outing as Leeds were dumped out of the Carabao Cup by Sheffield Wednesday suggesting the free transfer signing might flop.
But nobody can argue with his current form as he is having more of an impact for Farke than headline summer signings such as Alexander Isak or Viktor Gyokeres are currently having at their respective clubs.
| Premier League games | Premier League goals | |
| 2025/26 – Leeds | 14 | 5 |
| 2024/25 – Everton | 26 | 3 |
| 2023/24 – Everton | 32 | 7 |
| 2022/23 – Everton | 17 | 2 |
| 2021/22 – Everton | 17 | 5 |
Whether he can keep it up or not is another matter, as he only scored 17 Premier League goals in his final four campaigns at Everton combined, with just three last term.
Two of those seasons were wrecked by injury, but in terms of availability things have improved greatly of late, although his form was still extremely inconsistent, making Deeney’s criticism of the current purple patch short-sighted since it clearly is impressive by any recent measure.
On current form the 28-year-old probably is the top English striker outside of anyone not named Harry Kane, but he will have to maintain it for some time to help keep his manager in a job and prove it isn’t just a flash in the pan.
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