Boss Bielsa well-aware of Leeds United's good, bad and ugly

His trawl through more than 70 hours of footage from last season was an education in the flaws of a squad who ranked 13th in the Championship and the split between essential and surplus players was already established before Bielsa made his first appearance at Thorp Arch this week.

Leeds have informed those they intend to sell or move on, more than six in total, of Bielsa’s intentions and instructed them to look for alternative clubs. Bielsa admitted that he was prejudging the squad without the benefit of working with them first but said he had drawn “hundreds of conclusions” about it from videos of the recent Championship term.

Gaetano Berardi, Luke Ayling and Gjanni Alioski were three players name-checked positively by United’s new head coach during his introductory press conference on Monday; Berardi and Ayling for their defensive versatility and Alioski for what Bielsa termed “the length of his runs”.

“The more matches you watch, the more it reduces the chances that you might be wrong about a particular idea,” Bielsa said. “It can tell you that the number two can play in various positions across the defence, or that Berardi has also played on either side of defence and has filled in at centre-half, or the length of the runs made by Alioski. I could give you lots more conclusions I’ve drawn from watching this footage. It generated hundreds in my mind.”

Bielsa was careful not to talk openly about the deficiencies he identified but his appointment in itself, at a cost of over £2m a year, is evidence of how badly the board at Leeds wanted a change of direction and impetus. In the replays of last season, Bielsa will have spotted goalkeeping issues, defensive weakness, inconsistency across the board and, at times, a dearth of leadership. Leeds lacked goals and a dependable centre-forward – the issues behind their interest in Abel Hernandez and Matej Vydra – and looked predictable in their play, despite changing head coach in early February.

Asked to describe the players he needed to raise United to a more competitive level, Bielsa said: “A team is made up of all the different qualities you’d see in a myriad of footballers. An ideal footballer would have mental strength, sufficient ability and skill, be intelligent enough to interpret different types of play, be strong physically and brave with a competitive spirit.

“There’s no player anywhere who actually fits that bill but we’re trying to keep on our staff players we can guarantee plenty of playing time.”

Bielsa, a native of Rosario in Argentina, spoke through a translator at Monday’s press conference, as he did during his time as manager of Marseille and Lille in France. He learned English as a schoolboy but is now into his 60s and plans to embark on more lessons in an attempt to become more fluent.

As a Spanish speaker with a limited grasp of English, his appointment posed questions about the challenge of a language barrier at Thorp Arch but Bielsa said: “I’m confident that messages will be conveyed and reach the players.

“I’m very conscious of the importance of the spoken or written word in getting your message across. Getting players to play and appealing to players’ emotions and inspiring them, being a manager is all about that.

“The biggest factor which gets players playing is emotion, and how you express yourself goes hand in hand with that.

“If you struggle in a particular language, it’s unmistakable that you have a difficulty. But there are other ways of getting your point of view across – by showing how you feel.

“I have lots to thank my mother for but one thing in particular – she sent me to English classes for 15 years when I was a kid, hoping I’d be conducting this (press conference) in English. I’m going to try (to learn) but I said the same at the start in France and didn’t manage it.”