Forget Bamford: £35m Leeds dynamo who lost possession 25x cost Marsch dearly vs Palace – opinion
Bamford #Bamford
Leeds United‘s poor run of form in the Premier League continued as they tasted defeat at the hands of Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park.
The home side came from behind to record their first win in five outings and to condemn Jesse Marsch’s men to a fifth game without a victory themselves.
Pascal Struijk handed the Whites an early lead, firing home from short range in the tenth minute after Brenden Aaronson’s spectacular solo effort cannoned off the post into the defender’s path.
But it was short-lived as Odsonne Edouard headed home from Michael Olise’s free-kick just 14 minutes later before the Eagles snatched the game through Eberechi Eze, whose mazy run and long-range individual scorcher sailed past a helpless Illan Meslier.
It was certainly a tough afternoon for Leeds and in particular, the returning Patrick Bamford, who looked rusty and not quite 100% yet. It would be harsh to criticise him, having barely featured in the past 18 months.
However, winger Jack Harrison was arguably the most wasteful of the visitors’ starting lineup.
As per SofaScore, no player in the whole game lost the ball more times than the 25-year-old as he squandered possession an eye-watering 25 times – that was nearly half of his 53 touches, which only emphasises just how poor he was when Leeds were attacking.
The £35m-rated dynamo also managed just one shot throughout the 90 minutes he was on the pitch and to make matters worse, only two of his five dribbling attempts were successful, suggesting that he had a difficult game against his opposite number.
Elsewhere, Harrison won just five of nine duels and was careless in his passing, accurately finding a Leeds man with only 67% of his 27 attempts, also via SofaScore.
As LeedsLive reporter Beren Cross suggested on social media, the winger was “not doing enough” against the Eagles, so that – combined with the evidence above – only points to Harrison being rather costly for Marsch and co down in south-east London on Sunday afternoon.
It was a pretty disappointing display from one of the American’s usually reliable options.
AND in other news, Orta had a Leeds transfer blunder on “special” £6.5k-p/w “talent”, he’s better than Bamford…
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