Leeds Uniteds off-season until now

So like every other Leeds fan I am a bit disappointed by the lack of transfer activity from the club. One should think that we'd be used to these things from Leeds & Bates, and I guess in some ways we are, but I just had so much faith in Warnock and his promisses of 3-4 players in before his holiday - Holiday came and, almost, went and still the only new signing at ER remains center back Jason Pearce, without a doubt a great signing, but I had hoped for so much more. I was shocked to read that we could't afford Joel Ward or even free transfer target Paul Green, but then again we'll never know whether that story is true or not.

Warnocks retained list has also proven a big disappointment, half of the people on it is heavily linked away from the club, Ross McCormack, Snoddy, Aidy White and Lonergan, and people off the list have gotten zero attention from potential buyers. But looking at other clubs no one has really made a mark in the market yet, which gives me some hope that we might still get a few great signings in and get rid of some of our deadwood.

Among with the lack of transfers theres been massive romours of investments, takeovers or sponsorships in Leeds, and hopefully something will happen sooner rather then later - We do need some funds and we need to dig deep to get our beloved club out of the championsship.

I'll not take a stand on the takerover/investment talk before I read something on the official site, far to many romours is flying around on twitter and facebook, and can't get my head around which ones are true or not - so watch Leedsunited.com - hopefully they'll provide some answers before too long.

With regards to the transfers I refuse to panic (YET), like I've said, no one has really been on the market yet, and until the ball gets rolling from other clubs I don't expect to much for Leeds. Lets all agree to panic if we 6 weeks from now still haven't signed a soul ;)

Keep the faith and march on together!

Here's a picture of me age 5 before the World Cup in Mexico to give you a good laugh!
Euro2012 Go Denmark!

Goal of the year

Goal of the season was scored in Leicester in October. Following the thrashing we recieved from Blackpool days earlier, many had feared out trip to Leicester, but Leeds played one of their best games of the season and won it 1-0 on a stunning strike from Adam Clayton.

I didn't hurt his chances of winning goal of the year that it was scored against Kasper Schmeichel, a guy I really don't rate at all, despite him and me both being Danish.

The season have ended for Leeds and we might never see Adam Clayton in a Leeds shirt again. NW decided to transfer list him and I'd expect some decent teams to show interest in him, but if you'll win nothing else with Leeds Adam, I am happy to have you win goal of the year!

Marching on together 

Game of the season

There were two main contenders for game of the season, one was Forest away and the other were Millwall at home, both comes to mind because we said goodbye to our beloved Leeds legend Gary Speed at those two.
I have chosen the home game against Millwall as my game of the season, because of the emotions in the stands and the heartbreaking image of Batty, Macca & Strachan saying goodbye to their friend.

I listened to both games on the radio and could hardly hold back the tears when hearing the fans 11 minute tribute to Speedo in Nottingham (ending with Snoddy scoring as the 11th minute ran out), or when i heard the crowd at home against Millwall. We won both games but actually football didn't matter at those two occasions, we all just wanted to say goodbye to Speed.

I hope we won't have to go through something like that ever again, a young man leaving his family and his life is awful, and the worst part is we will never really know how Gary felt when he made his decision.
This was my goodbye to one of my first Leeds heroes: http://kimba1980.blogspot.com/2011/11/goodbye-to-true-leeds-united-legend.html

RIP GARY SPEED

Young player of the year

After spending two seasons away from Leeds on loans Tom Lees finally got his break this season. In an often outstreched and beaten backline he was, in my opinion, the only player who kept a decent level.

Leeds haven't had the best of season in the defensive department and have again let in alot of goals and have had some total black outs, I do however feel that Tom Lees have shown amazing promise and if he gets a more experienced guy next to him I believe he'll go on the achieve big things (I just hope it's in a Leeds shirt).

I had also considered Adam Clayton and Aidy White for the award but I did feel that Lees upheld a higher level throughout the season then the other two, also considering that he was often played out of position on the right back. I hope NW will play him in the central defence next season, the place where Lees is by far at his best.

Tommy, Congrats on being my player of the year, looking forward to seeing you get even better next year!

MOT.

Player of the year 2011/12

So the season is coming to a close and it's time to reflect on what was good and what was, well, not good.

I'll make four blogs over the coming days and in each I'll give an "award" to Player of the year, Young player of the year, Game of the year and Goal of the year.

I'll start out with player of the year, I had three guys in mind, Snoddy, Clayton and Ross McCormack. In the end I decided that my player of the year was Rossy.

The reason to pick him was that I fear where we had been without his many goals, and I also felt that he's been a great performer after a very tough first season at Elland Road. I actually predicted in August that he'd have a great season, so I'm quite pleased to have been right.

Many people feared that Ross would be a massive flop in Leeds and even though I think that many have Snoddy as their player of the year, I stand by Ross. We all knew that Snoddy would be great again this season, but Ross' form has taken alot of us by surprise (a very pleasent one).

So Mr.McCormack, congrats on being my player of the year (and sign that damn contract soon!!).

Luciano Becchios season

I spent way to much time on Twitter (@kimleeds if interested), and on there I became aware that many people blame Becchio for our bad season.
I will be the first to admit that Becchio hasn't had the kind of season we all hoped/expected, but I do however feel it's harsh for people to blame him and for people to want him to leave Leeds this summer.

The pre-season was ruined by an injury and after that he struggled to refind the shape that got him 19 league goals last year, yet he has still managed to get 10 goals in 22 starts (and 14 sub apperences). I feel Luciano was rushed back to action by Simon Grayson, a manager under presure who knew that Lucianos goals could be the difference between him keeping or losing his job.

Another problem for Luciano have been the sales of first Beckford, and perhaps more important Maxi Gradel, he had a wonderful connection with those two and he hasn't quite found that with Ross McCormack yet, I think it's because Ross is more all over the place and his style of play doesn't compliment Luciano's qualities.

Simon Grayson might have been criticised for his all out attack formations, but one thing is for sure, playing with the ball and passing it through midfield was better for Luciano then NW's long ball English 80's kick and rush style football.

I have no doubt that next season will be better, NW will get a few players in that he believes in and he'll not allow us to play the game the way we do this season, so I am pretty sure that Luciano will be back to his best next season and remind us all why we loved him so during his four years at Elland Road.

We'll face an exciting summer and I hope that NW will be able to asemble a good team for next season that will allow us to challenge for promotion instead of challeging for 10th place - and I KNOW that we'll see the real Luciano again come August.

Marching On Together!

The Scandinavian support

In Denmark where I live there's always been a lot of Leeds fans, there's even more in our neighbour countries Norway and Sweden. A couple of times a year loads of Scandinavian Leeds fans take the trip over to Leeds to watch the team the started loving during 60/70/80 or 90's televised games and from reading "Shoot" or "Match" football magazines.

I've been over to see Leeds three times and seen a total of six games (Always book for two homegames so the trip has a perfect ending with a game the day before leaving again), the first time was in League One and I saw a 1-1 draw and a 2-0 Tuesday win, the time after things started brightly with a 1-0 win against Sheffield U, but then disaster struck and have been staying with me since when visiting ER - The next game was the horrible 4-6 game against PNE, so that night I witness a Leeds record for conceding, and my next trip we saw another draw and off course on the Tuesday Blackpool smashed us 0-5, Leeds biggest home defeat in my lifetime, so once again a terrible Leeds record to witness.

My point with this blog is coming now, I was meant to have been over for the West Ham and Forest games, but my education and work got in the way, so sadly I couldn't make it, but after Tuesdays result I'm actually quite happy I couldn't, it would have been unbearable to witness my team break another tragic Leeds record.

I know about 1000 Scandinavians were over, among them many I know via facebook, twitter and of course in real life, and I must say that they took the defeat nicely, but then again you can't do much else then laugh when seeing games like those can you?

The support Leeds get from overseas is amazing, I have the utmost respect for all of the fans who spent loads of £'s on trips over again and again (and of course also all of you who live closer and spent big bucks on the club), and even if we sometimes fail (A LOT !!!), I still look forward to visiting Leeds again and hopefully this time colleting six points from my double game.

This picture is me after the Sheffield U game, you wouldn't want to see me after Preston.

Marching on together!