Marcelo Bielsa explains Liverpool lessons as head coach eyes collective responsibility for Leeds United's goals issue

Third-placed Leeds boast the best defensive record in the Championship but Bielsa says United’s lack of efficiency at the other end is worse than last season with the Whites having netted just 17 goals from their 14 league games - the joint worst record in the top ten along with tenth-placed Nottingham Forest who have played one game less.

Despite United’s lack of goals, Bamford has started every league game in the lone striker role with Arsenal loanee and England under-21s striker Eddie Nketiah having to make do with outings from the bench.

Bamford, who has gone nine games without scoring, is now suffering from an ankle problem with Bielsa unsure if Bamford will be fit for Saturday’s hosting of eighth-placed Queens Park Rangers

Bielsa admits he has considered starting the duo together in a league game for the first time with one playing behind the other but either way United’s head coach said it was up to other players and not just the club’s no 9 to net the required goals.

“It’s a team that is growing and is keeping the level defensively,” said Bielsa, assessing United’s position after 14 games.

“The team has improved offensive play as well, but the efficiency is worse now. Those are the three factors that are most important.

“Last season We had a problem in efficiency but this year we increased this problem and after there is something that is unfair which is that everybody points at the no 9 as the responsibility for the lack of efficiency in one team.

“The number nine is the player who is closest to the opponent’s goal but everybody is involved in the offensive play and there are other players who also share the lack of efficiency.

“We can score from outside of the box, we didn’t shoot a lot of times from outside the box.

“We can score in set pieces, situations starting in the middle and finishing in the middle and we are not having a good pass between the lines in the middle, aggressive and accurate and most of the goals are scored when you start from the side and you finish in the middle and we don’t show efficiency when we cross.

“We cross a lot, but it’s difficult for us to deliver to one player that is free in the box.

“I always analyse the offensive play of other teams - more in the teams that have a high level and have an impact in football.

“After I watched Liverpool’s last game, not yesterday’s match, but the league game and their efficiency they have shown to cross is very difficult to get.

“So it’s important not to point just at the centre forward as the only one responsible for the team not scoring enough.”

Asked what the scope was for Bamford and Nketiah to line up in the same side together but perhaps with one playing a different role to centre-forward, Bielsa said: “As wingers, no because none of them feel comfortable in this place. But one behind the other one is a possibility.”