Leeds United not 'well oiled machines' - Marcelo Bielsa telling a human interest story

When Charlton Athletic boss Lee Bowyer described Leeds United players as ‘well-oiled machines’ it was a compliment to them and their head coach Marcelo Bielsa.
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Just like when Danny Cowley, in charge of Huddersfield Town, said Bielsa had his Whites ‘on a remote control’ after their Yorkshire derby win at The John Smith’s Stadium.

There was an element of praise in what Scott Parker said after his Fulham side beat United in December.

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“Leeds are the most athletic, powerful team that we see but the most structured and patterned team as well,” he said.

“The movements they make are very scripted.”

What opposition managers are saying, in a nutshell, is that Bielsa has them very well trained, so well versed in his style of play that they are functioning like machines.

Machines are predictable, reliable, programmed to behave in a certain way, unthinking.

There was nothing predictable about the individual brilliance produced by Pablo Hernandez to win the game at Elland Road on Saturday against Reading. The footwork and the finish were pure skill and instinct.

Leeds United's Pablo Hernandez produced a moment of pure inspiration against Reading (Pic: Simon Hulme)Leeds United's Pablo Hernandez produced a moment of pure inspiration against Reading (Pic: Simon Hulme)
Leeds United's Pablo Hernandez produced a moment of pure inspiration against Reading (Pic: Simon Hulme)
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It was inspiration, not rote learning, that took him through a tiny gap and allowed him to deftly lift the ball into the top corner with a flick of his boot. Hernandez simply has the ability to do that. Other players do not.

Similarly, some of the tricks Helder Costa and Jack Harrison have used to leave full-backs in their wake, in the last two games, moments of sheer improvisation, could not have been less scripted.

And while Bielsa appreciates the compliments of his Championship peers, he cannot agree that Leeds players are anything other than flesh and blood.

“To think that the players are machines is maybe underestimating them,” he said.

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“I think it’s maybe not convenient to think like that. To lead a group is, fundamentally, to deal with the human.

“Nobody that treats a human being like a machine can, from my point of view, develop a long-lived leadership.

“In enterprise maybe they interpret people as machines but they are mechanical activities, that admit this kind of treatment of people, even though I don’t agree with this.”

What stands at the heart of Bielsa’s treatment of his players, who let us remember, all have specific roles and functions in his never-changing playing system, is what allows them to tap into their own creativity on the football pitch.

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By recognising they are human beings and ensuring their human emotional needs are met, Bielsa attempts to create an environment in which players are confident in their ability to create.

“What I believe is that in football, leadership is fundamentally a human activity,” said Bielsa.

“Many times to summarise one idea, people describe a team as having roboticized players to give an idea of correct functioning, that a team is well oiled.

“Of course I am grateful for what those managers said but the important thing is try to make sure the player is happy inside himself to show his skills.

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Football is a creative activity and it is irregular because, as human beings, we are not regular in our behaviours. However, it is observed as mechanical because it is easier to analyse it like that.”

It could be assumed, therefore, given the fate that befell Reading last weekend at his hands, or dancing feet rather, that Hernandez is happy and that a happy Hernandez is a dangerous Hernandez.

But it’s not quite as simple as that.

Bielsa revealed last week that Mateusz Klich, the midfielder who runs close to a superhuman 12km in a game – including 1km of high intensity sprints – runs most when he’s angry.

For all the distance Bielsa likes to keep between himself and his players, a picture is emerging that he has garnered a real understanding of exactly how they tick as individuals, as humans with wildly varying motivations and needs.

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Perhaps this is why Klich has dubbed the head coach a ‘great psychologist’ and why the Polish international doesn’t believe the club needs to employ a qualified one.

And maybe, just maybe, that is why when, owing to a recent poor run of results, panic rose like floodwater all around Thorp Arch, Bielsa kept his players safe, warm and dry behind flood defences made out of the knowledge of the good things they have already done, the reassurance that they’re the same players and the same team who compiled an 11-game unbeaten streak earlier this season and his belief that sometimes you just don’t get what you deserve.

“Football is a discipline where maybe you have the same performance but you get a different result,” he said.

“That makes football unpredictable and emotional because there is nothing that says clearly what is going to happen.

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“In front of the same performance you have different effects, result. For this reason is so attractive.”

On paper and on statistics, as compiled and intepreted by super computers, Leeds should win every game they play, especially games like tonight’s trip to struggling Middlesbrough, and win promotion.

But football is played on grass by humans, not robots. There is no script. But what Bielsa is writing at Elland Road is a great human interest story.