Patrick Bamford looks set to start the second-leg of Leeds United’s Championship play-off semi-final.
In comments by the Yorkshire Evening Post, Liam Cooper has suggested that Patrick Bamford has trained harder while being suspended after apologising for his actions against Aston Villa, and added that he backed the striker to silence his doubters due to his weird level of confidence.
Bamford looked set to play more of a peripheral role for however long Leeds spend in the play-offs after getting suspended for deceiving the officials during the game against Villa, especially after Kemar Roofe’s superb performance and goal during the first-leg of their semi-final tie with Derby County.
But with the Yorkshire Evening Post reporting that Roofe is out of the second-leg due to injury, Bamford has another chance to silence his critics. And Cooper explained ahead of Wednesday’s game at Elland Road that the striker looks so determined to make up for his error against Villa.
“He came straight in and apologised to me and the boys for what happened, and the staff,” he said, as reported by the Yorkshire Evening Post. “It’s one of them things. In the heat of the moment sometimes you make stupid decisions and Pat will admit that but he’ll tell you that in these last 10 days when he’s been suspended, he’s certainly trained a lot harder than he would if he was playing.
“There are no worries about Pat being fit and we all know what Pat can do . He’s got this unbelievable confidence about him where if he misses chances he always knows he’s going to score. It’s a weird confidence but a good one to have in the team. We all take from that as well.”
Bamford’s record since his move to Leeds is not actually that bad, and some of his goals looked like they may be crucial in the automatic-promotion race, particularly the brace at Preston North End last month.
He may ask different questions that the ones that Roofe posed at the weekend, but Derby may be just as worried about facing the former Chelsea man because he has shown that he can be a brilliant finisher.
And with Leeds boasting a 1-0 lead from the first-leg, Bamford may need just one chance to send Marcelo Bielsa’s men to Wembley and stake his claim to start ahead of Roofe if the Whites do reach the final.
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