Leeds United Academy graduate Bailey Peacock-Farrell has admitted recently that he may ultimately leave the club in the future if he feels he won’t have an opportunity to win back his first team spot.
The 22-year-old took a lot of unfair flack given his age and relative experience in the first half of the 2018/19 Championship campaign, and his better performance and key saves seems to have become overlooked by some. In any event, in the January transfer window we brought in Spanish goalkeeper Kiko Casilla and he almost immediately replaced BPF between the sticks.
However, as fans will know, Casilla himself didn’t have a great first half year in the English game and he made a number of high profile clangers – one of which came against Derby County in the Play-Off Semi-Final battles.
With significant doubts over the 32-year-old now, there were already calls for BPF to return to the starting XI, and there are those who feel Casilla will be better next term now he’s had longer to adjust to our game.
Speaking to Sky Sports recently, Peacock-Farrell admitted that with only 12 months left on his current contract, his future was somewhat up in the air.
“Club-wise, I couldn’t tell you. I’ve spoken to the owner. He mentioned a few things in terms of the plans for me next year. They said they want to offer me a new deal which is great, but that was two or three weeks ago and I haven’t heard anything since. The aim for me is to be number one at Leeds and play at Leeds but, if that is not the case, I may have to look elsewhere. I have to be selfish and think of my career and I have to try and keep progressing. I can’t afford to stall in any way.”
Adding.
“To maybe miss another season, let’s say I will be number two at Leeds, I can’t afford that. Obviously I want to play for Northern Ireland as well and to do that I need to be playing at the highest possible level that I can do. What I would want is to play for Leeds but that is a discussion that needs to happen with the owner and the manager and, if that doesn’t go the way it’s planned, I will have to look elsewhere.”
With plenty in the fanbase already seemingly split about BPF, I imagine plenty will be hoping he gets more of a shot next season to keep his own development curve going given the clear talent he has (despite naturally having aspects of his game to work on) and then there will be those who feel he’s maybe demanding more than he should at this stage of his career.