Ex-Leeds United man on Jesse Marsch transfer pressure, player frustration and Whites balancing act

The arrival of Leeds United's record signing Georginio Rutter adds pressure for Jesse Marsch, but it's a pressure he will and should welcome.

I had the pleasure of welcoming Rutter in an LUTV interview and what I can say is that he has a great disposition. He's a happy lad, he was genuinely excited to be here and although he's still a young man, at 20 years of age, with plenty of growth and maturing to do, from what I saw, from his interactions with club staff and from talking to him, he comes across as a really nice kid. He wants to get going, he clearly has a lot of ability and confidence but he also seems to have a really good character, which is important.

His signing is another sign of the backing Marsch has had from the board. Pressure it always there for managers wherever they are in the table, that doesn't leave you, but when your club goes and invests then it naturally adds even more, as well as expectation.. As a manager you would always want to be backed, you want to have that sort of pressure and I think a manager would like problems such as trying to fit in all these attacking players, rather than looking around for options to try.

The emergence of Crysencio Summerville, which I think has been a pleasant surprise, and Willy Gnonto, who was supposed to be here much later if indeed he came this season and has been superb, Patrick Bamford coming back and scoring at Villa, top goalscorer Rodrigo and now Rutter, give Marsch options a-plenty. Now he has to work out how to best get goals and form out of all of them. Of course there will be rotation, he will rely on some more than others but it's really important that they're all fit and involved, because we will have a really strong attacking line-up whichever way we want to play.

We have exciting players in attacking areas, so that's great, but football has always been about balance and it's all about making sure we keep it tight at one end yet score at the other and I'm not sure we've quite got the balance right just yet. There are lots of things still to work on but I think the parts are certainly there.

Going into the Cardiff City FA Cup game I think the players will be frustrated. We were all frustrated after the loss to Aston Villa. You shouldn't be doing this, of course, but if you take the goals out of the game and watch it without the goals you'll come away thinking we should have won or at least got a point. But we didn't. And as much as I think there's some really good stuff that we showed on Friday we don't want to get into the habit of being unlucky losers who played really well and didn't get anything from it.

It's getting to the point now where it's not how spectacular we play, it's about how many points you pick up. And that's where I think suddenly things start to shift, the pressure mounts and it is all about results because the frustration of the players will come from playing well and we're not getting results. The sooner they do get those results then they can continue with that upward trajectory, but without those points it comes in more and more difficult.

Against Cardiff we've just got to get the result, it's as simple as that because sometimes in previous years the cups might not have been so important but the timing of this one, how we ended up needing a replay, the fact that it's at home, what we've got compared with them, makes it huge. It's huge in respect of allowing the manager and players to operate under a little less pressure and it's a huge chance to take a step forward.

We know we have a lot in attack, but can we show that balance and a solid defensive display? A step forward will be welcome, but the result is paramount.