Charlie Taylor is set to leave Leeds United in the coming weeks, with his Elland Road contract expiring.
Charlie Taylor’s comments to the Yorkshire Evening Post at the end of last season could go to show the real reason behind his impending departure from Leeds United.
Taylor is set to leave Leeds in the coming weeks, with his contract running down.
The left-back appears to have burned his bridges at Elland Road, after refusing to play for the Yorkshire side on the final day of the season.
Taylor has been heavily criticised at Leeds for the way he has gone about his exit.
The 23-year-old’s decision to sit out of Leeds’ match against Wigan Athletic is indefensible, but it cannot be said that he didn’t give the Whites warning about what they needed to do to keep him.
Taylor claimed just last season that it was still his dream to play in the Premier League with Leeds, and he just wanted to see some ambition from the club in the transfer market to convince him to stay.
“It’s no secret that a few of us are up next year – me, Cooky, Mowatt – and I’m not really sure where that’s at,” Taylor said, back in 2016.
“The dream is still to play in the Premier League with Leeds. I’m not just saying that, it’s how we look at it. But it’s the same every season – you get to the end of it and say ‘next year could be our year’. Maybe it could be this time. The season tickets (United’s recent promotion offering fans a partial refund if they fail to reach the play-offs next term) are a big thing, I’ve not seen that before. I just hope that there’s some investment in the summer. Because if that happens then next year could be our year. That’s how it works.
“When I think about it properly, it’s massively frustrating because you think about how it would be if we had a really good go. We could be up with the Boros, the Burnleys. There is quality here, that’s true, but there do need to be additions.”
Last summer Leeds did some good business, but none of their new recruits screamed ambition.
The Whites mostly brought in loan players, with their two expensive recruits Kemar Roofe and Marcus Antonsson both arguably failing to live up to their price tags.
Indeed, the uncertainty around Leeds’ plans has remained heading into the new campaign.
Garry Monk’s future has still not been resolved and Leeds have seen many key players return to their parent clubs, following the termination of their loan spells at Elland Road.
Predicting where Leeds will finish next season looks to be a fools’ errand at the moment, and it seems this instability finally proved too much for Taylor.
The defender will remain public enemy number one at Leeds – but some of the supporters’ wrath over his exit should also be directed at the club’s board, who simply did not do enough to convince Taylor to stay.
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