Jermaine Beckford expecting big things from Leeds United attacking duo

Instead, attempts at a Championship ‘restart’ are only just beginning.

A gap of 11 weeks and counting since Leeds United’s last league game will have benefitted some more than others.

Quite how much Jean-Kevin Augustin would have featured in a season ending in May is open to serious debate.

Yet Augustin has already made a big impression during the Championship’s hiatus via his training updates and former Whites striker Jermaine Beckford believes the Frenchman can now come good on the pitch.

Leeds unveiled the signature of striker Augustin on January 27 with the forward joining on loan for the rest of the season from Red Bull Leipzig with an option to buy.

Even Manchester United were interested in the 22-year-old’s services but Whites head coach Marcelo Bielsa quickly warned it would take time for the new arrival to hit his stride and reach Bielsa’s desired fitness levels. The Bielsa way.

As part of a dismal day at Nottingham Forest on February 8, Augustin finally made his Whites debut 12 days after signing for Leeds when coming on as a 71st-minute substitute for Patrick Bamford.

Two more late second-half appearances in the 1-1 draw at Brentford and 1-0 win at home to Bristol City followed before Augustin picked up a hamstring strain.

With a little over two months of the season remaining, time looked to be running out in Augustin’s bid to make a meaningful impression on the second half of United’s second campaign under Marcelo Bielsa.

Yet Augustin’s social media updates have made for intriguing viewing of late with the forward known as ‘Big Kev’ instead resembling a ‘Lean Kev’ and now back fully fit as the Championship aims to near a resumption following the break in play due to the country’s battle against coronavirus.

With the EFL outlining July 31 as the date for when the season must be concluded, Augustin now has two more months to play with and Beckford believes the Frenchman can use them to good effect.

“I’ll be honest, when he first came in, in my opinion, he looked quite heavy set,” said Beckford of Augustin to the YEP.

“He was quite a surprising acquisition because he doesn’t really fit in with the Leeds United body shape under Marcelo Bielsa. I was quite surprised by that.

“But maybe he is one for next season and Bielsa knows something that we all don’t know.

“Maybe he has seen something in the 1089 billion minutes that he has seen him train and play in and what not.

“He does a lot of research into every player and every team that he plays against so it’s not just a signing that is on a whim so I would like to see when Augustin is fit, really fighting fit, and see what he offers.

“You can tell he puts his body about but he has not really had many minutes or much game time so it’s quite difficult to judge him right now.”

Quite when United’s next matchday scenario will present itself remains to be seen though the EFL were understood to be looking at the weekend of June 20 for a possible date for Championship resumption.

And while not quite in the same category as Augustin in terms of recovering from a ‘recent’ injury setback, Beckford feels the best is still very much to come from another young Whites forward in Tyler Roberts. Roberts cracked a bone in his shin immediately after joining Leeds and suffered a series of other injuries in his first full season at Elland Road.

“He’s had a tricky time with his injuries,” said Beckford of 21-year-old Roberts.

“He’s another player that is very exciting.

"He’s got a lot about him. He’s still young but he’s learning so quickly and in terms of hold up play and work rate, I don’t think there are many players better than Patrick Bamford that he can learn from right now, to learn that side of the game.

"I think the thing he has over Patrick is that his natural instinct is to be in front of goal where you are able to get shots off and you are able to score.

"He does that more naturally than Patrick Bamford does.

"He is still a little bit immature with a couple of the things that he does when he is on the field but he’s had multiple injury lay-offs so he is trying to find his feet again and he is trying to get back to a position where he plays week in, week out.

"He’s a very good player and I am a big fan of him as well. He is definitely going to make waves.”