Anthony Stokes was once linked with a move to Elland Road in 2016 at a time when the Whites were looking for a regular goal threat up top.
That scenario rings true to this very day, with the Whites suffering a dismal season that promised so much early on, yet delivered so little as it wended its way through 2018. With just two games left in the campaign, and only three wins spanning four months since January 1, Leeds United find themselves again hunting goals.
A lack of goals seems to be Leeds United’s elephant in the changing room so-to-speak, German loanee striker Pierre-Michel Lasogga leading the Leeds United line on 10 for the season. However, with his £50,000-per-week wages and inconsistencies in his all-round play, it doesn’t look like the Whites will take the plunge on the bustling forward.
A cheaper option, yet one with goal potential, could very well be former Sunderland and Celtic striker Anthony Stokes. The Dublin-born Stokes came to prominence at Scottish giants Celtic who once shelled out £1.3 million for his services. At the Bhoys he was on fire, featuring in 192 games, scoring 76 goals and providing 66 assists.
Yet a different fire seems to burn inside of Stokes, one that conflicts with his ability to settle down and play to the level that he is clearly capable of. He rejoined Hibernian for a third spell in August 2017, yet left by the ubiquitous ‘mutual consent’ in January of this year. In that short spell, he’d underlined his undoubted potential with a burst of 11 goals.
Yet controversy and conflict, such as his €230,000 fine, levied in 2017, for assaulting an Elvis impersonator in a Dublin nightclub in 2013 is never far behind him. It is ‘controversy’ of a sort that sees him as a free agent after just a four-game spell in Greece for Appolon Smyrni – the Greek side having taken him on in early February after his Hibs release.
However, he’s just been sacked by the club who were furious after he went off the radar for over a week, leaving the bosses of Apollon Smyrni furious at his indiscipline. According to the Daily Record, the bosses at the Greek club were not looking to back down and that they were “making moves to terminate his contract.”
And according to football transfer tracking website FootballDatabase.eu saying that his just what has happened, Stokes leaving the Greek club yesterday, Friday 20 April. Which in a round-a-bout way brings us back to 2016 and Leeds United. The Whites need goals, Anthony Stokes needs a club – it’s almost perfect synergy.
Almost. Almost but not quite.
In reality not by a long shot. As Leeds United’s season has shown, rebuilding and cohesion are needed at the club. A bright start was rent asunder in an abject spiral of results that has seen 2018 turn into a whirlpool of fumbling and failing fortunes. It is much more than an Elastoplast fix that Leeds United require in order to advance and improve next season.
In essence that is just what Anthony Stokes would be; an Elastoplast fix when a full cast is needed. Sure, he’d likely weigh in with some goals – he has that potential. Yet there is another fire burning in him and it might not be one that Leeds United can, or will want to, quench. Rather than rekindling old interest and Stokes-ing the fire; the Whites should leave the embers to simply die down.
