Has Brendan Rodgers just gifted each and every Premier League team the blueprint of how to beat Marcelo Bielsa’s Leeds United?
It is no coincidence that, even during last season’s Championship title-winning campaign, this free-flowing Whites side dropped points against the likes of Charlton, Millwall and Luton. Essentially, teams who sit back in numbers, absorb the pressure and aim to hit Leeds quickly on the break.
In Monday’s 4-1 humbling against Leicester, the Yorkshire giants faced those reactive tactics for the first time since promotion.
Rodgers said before the game that he planned to stop Bielsa’s attacking carousel from spinning with an immovable low block, while using the rapid pace of Jamie Vardy and Harvey Barnes in the most rapid of transitions.
It worked a treat.
It just to happens that, on Saturday, Leeds will face a team who see counter-attacking as not merely a useful weapon in their armoury but their designated Plan A.
Wilf Zaha, Andre Ayew and Andros Townsend tore Manchester United apart in that famous 3-1 win at Old Trafford on the opening day and, if the fleet-footed trio click this weekend, those gaps in behind Bielsa’s back-line could be exploited with alarming regularity.
The defence splitting potential of Eberechi Eze, a man who caused Leeds huge problems in the Championship with QPR, could be key.
With five goals in seven games, meanwhile, Zaha is in top form.
Suddenly, there is an air of confidence about a fanbase who, before Monday, might have been suffering sleepless nights at the prospect of going head-to-head with Bielsa’s rapid-fire football.
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