Pawel Cibicki has been made to wait for his chance at Leeds.
Director of football Victor Orta has been the man to blame for many of Leeds United’s supporters this season, as a shot at the Championship play-offs falls by the wayside once again.
Tuesday night’s 2-0 loss to Fulham ended any remaining hopes that the Whites were going to stage a last-minute run to achieve a place in the top six, with Orta’s business in the transfer market viewed as the main culprit for the club’s failures.
The likes of Felix Wiedwald, Caleb Ekuban, Mateusz Klich, Jay-Roy Grot and arguably Pierre-Michel Lasogga have all been way below the required standard despite costing a decent wedge in the summer.
The same could be said for Swedish forward Pawel Cibicki, who has been afforded just seven Championship outings during his first season at Elland Road, culminating in a total of just 386 minutes.
The £1.5million signing joined from Malmo with optimism coursing round the famous Leeds ground, but he has hardly been given a chance to showcase his talent in his favoured position. Instead, he has been used out wide.
With six league games to play and 10 points separating the Whites from the top six, Paul Heckingbottom will be excused in handing chances to those on the fringes of his squad and Cibicki should be one of those who is given a chance.
But instead of playing him out of position on the flanks, Heckingbottom should give the 24-year-old Swede the chance to shine in his favoured centre-forward role, and in turn finally find a striker capable of scoring regularly within the Leeds ranks.
The Whites will be expected to show some sort of dominance at Elland Road on Saturday as they face 23rd-placed Sunderland, and starting Cibicki up front could prove to be somewhat of a secret weapon in their quest for three points.
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