Leeds United attacker reveals boss chat in battle to start assessment and highlights Whites next 'big thing'

Dan James has assessed the battle for a Leeds United starting jersey and declared the next “big thing” for his Whites.

James missed six weeks of the season with a hamstring injury suffered in August’s 2-0 win at Sheffield Wednesday but the Wales international winger has returned in fine form and now has four goal involvements from his last two games.

Having been benched for the 2-0 win at home to QPR before the November international break, James came back into the XI for last weekend’s return to Swansea City in which he claimed two assists and also supplied the cross to force a Swans own goal.

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Despite his impact, James was then dropped to the bench for Wednesday night’s hosting of Luton Town as Manor Solomon and Willy Gnonto started out wide but James quickly made an impact having been brought on with 21 minutes left.

Twelve minutes later, a beautiful lobbed finish led to James scoring his third goal of the campaign for a side who sit top of the Championship and now have yet another winger to call on in fit-again star Largie Ramazani.

Assessing the battle to start, James admits Farke has quite the task trying to keep everybody happy but hailed the boss for doing so as he also eyed the next “big thing” for Leeds to further improve.

Adding more clean sheets, says James, is now key to his team getting even better - whoever starts for a side blessed with an armoury of attacking options.

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Asked by BBC Radio Leeds about dropping to the bench on Wednesday - and how he was after recovering from injury - James declared: “I'm feeling really good. The manager spoke to me before the game and I've always got to be happy with the decisions.

"I want to play every game but we've got a great squad here. The way we rotate plays is great. You've got to be ready for that.

"I think we all know that the manager, it's up to him. He makes the decisions. We've got a lot of players back fit now and think it's always making it hard for him to make them decisions.

"But I think in them games, it's always nice to come on as well, it's something a little bit different and you've got to be ready to perform. It's nice to see Largie back again, he is another player that can add a lot to the team and the manager is doing well to keep everyone happy."

Pressed on how Leeds could now improve even further as a team, James declared: “The big one for us is clean sheets. It's something that we wanted to build on last year. I think clean sheets, we always know we're going to create chances, so we have just got to build on that."