YEP journalist shares what friendlies Leeds are likely to play in pre-season
Leeds United are likely to take a similar approach to this pre-season as they did before the Championship season restarted in June, according to Joe Urquhart.
Writing on his personal Twitter account on Wednesday, the Yorkshire Evening Post journalist said that he thinks the players will return to pre-season training on Thursday and that any friendly matches will be intra-squad ones.
Leeds were one of few clubs to not play a friendly against another club before the Championship season got back on track in June.
After three months of not playing any competitive games, Leeds’ promotion rivals West Brom prepared for the restart with trips to play Aston Villa and Manchester United in behind-closed-doors friendlies.
Leeds didn’t take that approach with Marcelo Bielsa opting to do 11-versus-11 matches among his squad at Thorp Arch.
Explaining that decision in June, Bielsa as quoted by the Yorkshire Evening Post as saying: “We had three players per position so we had three teams.
“Leeds allowed us to do a lot of football training which was very, very useful for us.
“We think that in this way, it was going to be enough for us. We had preferred to continue with this preparation.”
Clearly, Leeds’ preparation for the final nine matches of last season was good enough as they picked up 22 points out of the 27 available and secure the Championship title and promotion back to the Premier League.
Bielsa might have learned a lot from the way he got his team up to speed in June and he seems as though he could take the same approach ahead of the 2020/21 Premier League season kicking off on September 12.
In other Leeds United news, the Whites are set to complete another new signing today.