“Brought the club, the team and the fans back together” – Many Leeds fans discuss key man

Many Leeds United fans have been discussing who has been the club’s Player of the Decade, as the 2010s near their end.

The past decade has not been as favourable as many in West Yorkshire would have hoped for, with each year spent in the Championship longing for a Premier League return after securing promotion out of League One in 2010.

Only three of our nine campaigns in the second-tier have led to top-half finishes, though, and of those, only last season saw the club break into the Play-Offs and challenge for a place in the top-flight.

But it was not to be in 2018/19, as we lost in the Semi-Finals to Derby County, yet there have been numerous stars to step out onto the field at Elland Road and represent the Whites with pride since the start of 2010.

Fans have often championed the likes of Jermaine Beckford, Luciano Becchio, Ross McCormack and Pablo Hernandez, and now look back on those of that ilk as potentially our best player of the decade.

Beckford made 147 outings for United between his emergence from the academy and his departure for Everton, but of those, only a handful came in the current decade having moved to Goodison Park in July 2010.

He ended his final term at Elland Road with 30 goals in 51 games across all competitions, though, including that memorial FA Cup strike away to Manchester United and a later brace at Tottenham Hotspur.

Becchio, meanwhile, arrived in West Yorkshire in 2008 and stayed until 2013, scoring 86 times in 219 games, while McCormack hit 58 in 157 matches between August 2010 and July 2014.

Hernandez, on the other hand, arrived at Elland Road initially on loan in 2016 as his career should have been winding down aged 31, but recently signed a contract extension keeping the Spanish playmaker at the club until the summer of 2022.

The 34-year-old has made 136 outings for United, scoring 30 times and assisting 33.

Here are some of the messages shared as fans put forward their Player of the Decade…

Beckford

— Daz (@super_whites) December 9, 2019

Think people have overlooked this. I think Jansson should be at the top. He brought the club, the team and the fans back together. That monk season re-glued our club.

— Einhorn_Is_Finkle (@Batley_White) December 9, 2019

Definitely Pablo.

— Michael 💙💛 (@Mickledonions) December 9, 2019

Got to be Pablo surely

— Georgina Jane Petty (@orangina17) December 9, 2019

Ben White and it’s only been half a season

— Ron (@ronaallleeds) December 9, 2019

Beckford!!!

— Lauryn Hall💙💛 (@LaurynHall88) December 9, 2019

Beckford, Becchio, Phillips or Pablo

— elliot (@Elliot_JonJones) December 9, 2019

McCormack, Wood, Becchio are up there, but I’d say Pablo.

— Batesy (@batesylufc2) December 9, 2019

Morrison

— Samuel (@LufcSS1) December 9, 2019