'He watches every game' - Patrick Bamford reveals Barcelona star Ousmane Dembele asked for Leeds United shirt swap

Patrick Bamford has revealed that Barcelona star Ousmane Dembele is a "massive fan" of Leeds United - having swapped shirts with the forward.

United's leading marksmen is currently enjoying a prolonged rest over the March international break, having taken the Premier League by storm this term.

Bamford has scored 14 goals and provided six assists in the top flight under Marcelo Bielsa following promotion from the Championship last summer.

The 27-year-old narrowly missed out on an England call-up to Gareth Southgate's Three Lions squad for this week's international action.

Several of his Thorp Arch teammates have instead headed out of West Yorkshire to link up with their national teams.

One of those is United's first choice goalkeeper Illan Meslier - who is away with France's Under-21s squad competing in the group stage of the UEFA European Under-21 Championship.

The Whites shot stopper, though, made an odd request to Bamford before his departure following last week's win over Fulham much to the striker's bemusement.

Meslier claimed his shirt and has now done a swap deal with one of his international teammates, who it turns out has been keeping a close eye on the Elland Road club.

“After the Fulham game he was like ‘I need your shirt please'”, Bamford told the Official Leeds United podcast.

“I said ‘yeah, it’s fine. Who for?’ He said ‘Ah, [Ousmane] Dembele’. I said ‘wait, who?’. He said ‘the guy from Barcelona’.

“I was like ‘what, he wants my shirt?’ and he was like ‘yeah, he wants yours and Kalvin’s [Phillips] shirts because he’s a massive fan of Leeds and watches every game’.

“I was like ‘you serious?’ and I said ‘okay, but you’ve got to get me his shirt then in return’, so he FaceTimed me at midnight the other day and showed me this Barcelona shirt that says ‘to my bro Bamford, from Dembele'."

Victor Orta, you know what to do.