Things seem to be settling somewhat at Elland Road. Results are picking up a little and Leeds United seem to be playing the brand of football that Garry Monk envisages as being the way forward for the Whites.
Monk’s Leeds sit on a two-match winning streak and in 15th place in the Sky Bet Championship table, five points away from the relegation zone and only four points away from the play-off places. It’s early doors yet, a mantra that Leeds United fans were repeating as poor result after poor result seemingly piled up on the beleaguered Whites.
Soon fans began looking for someone to blame; in times of desperation, anyone can fulfil this particular role. In times past it has been a procession of players from Jason Pearce, through Tom Lees and stretching to Sol Bamba. Fans at Leeds are quick to love but equally quick to criticise, often with varying degrees of justification.
However, in recent times the doomsayer element of the Elland Road crowd, who rightly have their gripes, have been augmented by the media – many publications eager to fill both column inches and seemingly Leeds fans with a sense of anger. There’s always an agenda that they need to sell copy.
It seems of late that the latest ‘daily’ to jump on the Leeds United bandwagon is the Daily Star. Remember last year when Steve Evans was the Leeds manager? The Star came up with a story about Evans’ frame not fitting the training clobber at Elland Road and that he had the Leeds badge sewn over his old Rotherham gear – a classic case of ‘fat shaming’.
Then there was the ‘here’s how much Leeds players earn per week‘ expose from the same paper – based on what Football Manager 2016 said in its database. Well the Pulitzer Prize didn’t come from that particular article but The Star still pushes its tawdry anti-Leeds stance with its rabble-rousing report that Hadi Sacko’s brilliance as Monk’s Leeds beat Blackburn in midweek saved Monk’s job at Elland Road.
The tsunami of supposition and conjecture continueth with today’s report from the The Star’s Sunday edition that the Machiavellian maverick that is Massimo Cellino is planning a “major shake up” at Elland Road and the newspaper asks the question that is on no-one’s lips: “is this the end for Garry Monk?”
Quoting that other bastion of journalistic truth and credibility otherwise known as The Sun, the Star say that il generale Cellino was about to impose his version of Cellino-law on Leeds United and parachute in Barnsley assistant manager Tommy Wright with The Sun saying this move will be imposed “whether boss Garry Monk likes it or not” with the nation’s best-selling red top saying that doing this will mean “adding to strife behind the scenes.”
Leeds fans that read this I apologise for some of the absolute tripe that I have no doubt written about our club, especially the Lee Erwin piece that I did. I also apologise to Blackpool fans for writing a piece that almost legitimised the way that the Oystons were running the club. I apologise to every fan of every club where I have gotten even one minor fact wrong or caused even one injurious slight.
But Heavens above, I mean these are newspapers that are in nationwide circulation and with websites that have feelers reaching out to the deepest corners of the world. These were newspapers that had scantily clad young woman on page 3 supposedly commenting on news in sections called ‘News in Briefs’ in what they tried to defend as some form of national institution.
I’m not sure about breasts on page 3 but they are making tits out of anyone that reads stories such as these and takes them in any serious form.
As my Grandfather was fond of saying: “Only talk 5lb of s**t if you have a bag big enough to carry it home in.”
I’m not sure about how big The Star’s bag is but I am pretty certain it won’t be big enough to carry all they are spouting.
