Brendan Rodgers has raved about the ‘brilliant’ Marcelo Bielsa on Sky Sports (31/10/20 at 1:40 pm) and shared that he has been watching the Leeds coach ‘for a very long time’.
Both Rodgers and Bielsa are considered to be two of the brightest and best footballing brains in the game today.
They will lock horns on Monday night when the Foxes take on high-flying Leeds in what is set to be an enthralling tactical encounter.
Rodgers has been making a name for himself for 10 years now, but his opposite number has been in the game for far longer, as the Northern Irishman labelled him a ‘wonderful pioneer’ of the game.
“He’s been brilliant,” Rodgers told Sky Sports. “I have been following him for a long time. I first started coaching back in the 90s’ and this was when I was looking into coaching, and not just in our country, but around the world.
“He was, at that point, in Argentina. So, I followed him really from that point. From Argentina into Chile. Then he goes into club football at Athletic Bilbao where a lot of people would have seen him in terms of the way he plays.
“He’s a wonderful pioneer of a game. He plays a unique style. It’s very man-to-man marking. They try to run the legs off you and you have to run like hell in the game to keep up with them. Lots of rotation and lots of mobility in the team. They want to create and score goals.
“But, at the same time, they offer up space which hopefully you can exploit. He has been great. He has taken a great club out of the Championship into the Premier League and they have made a terrific start.”
Just like Aston Villa’s clash with Leeds last Friday, this forthcoming game will be pretty enjoyable on the eye for the neutral supporter.
Whilst that game at Villa Park ended up in a convincing win for the Yorkshire side, for large parts of the match there was some serious battles across the pitch, especially in the wide areas.
Expect the same at Elland Road and it wouldn’t be a surprise if it is a goal-fest given the attack-minded nature in which Rodgers and Bielsa like to play in.
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