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Leeds Suffer A Blow Yes, But It Could’ve Been Worse & The Small Minded Criticism On The Back Is Amazing

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Typically I was offline and otherwise engaged on Tuesday when this news broke, and I appreciate some may well take a pop, but I’m entitled to give my two-penneth worth on news that Leeds United striker Patrick Bamford now faces four months on the sidelines with a Posterior Cruciate Ligament injury.

The 25-year-old came in over the summer from Middlesbrough for a reported rising £7million fee and he has only made two starts in the EFL Cup, with a return of one goal, for us given the form of Kemar Roofe in particular. He has featured in our bright start to life in the Championship of 2018/19 though, with five substitute appearances.

He sustained the injury during last Friday’s game against Bristol City as we hosted them in Under 23 competition at Elland Road and obviously the news is disappointing for all.

Having rightly been wished well on social media, my take on it is it’s obviously a blow for the club and not just the player. He’s trying to get life up and running with us and this is the last thing he needed, but there’s an element of perspective here. Out of all of the knee injuries he could’ve sustained, this is actually one of the better ones to my understanding. Four months might be a long time in life generally, but four months isn’t ten months, it’s not 12 months.

We haven’t lost him for the season and for that we should be thankful I feel.

For those paying attention to social media, I don’t get those fans who took it as an opportunity to dig at the club or manager Marcelo Bielsa for having the temerity to play him at Under 23 level. To get the best out of any player they need games, confidence and minutes under their belt. Training is not enough to be match sharp and some of the comments on the above Tweet make me shudder…real life is not a computer game, some fans don’t seem to realise that obviously.

If he was determined to make a success of his move to Leeds to begin with, he’ll double down now and come back even stronger and that benefits us and him further down the line.

With some concerns about Bielsa’s style of play and whether players can give that much over the course of an entire season, Bamford could actually come back to full fitness at just the right time if those concerns prove to be true.

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