Our latest head coach wants to treat the travelling Leeds army to a good performance at Blackburn Rovers, but he needs to decide which two of his three central defenders will start the game.
Leeds are taking just short of 6,900 fans to Blackburn tomorrow, and Neil Redfearn was full of praise for us on the official site. "It’s an unbelievable following. Our supporters are second to none, there are no two ways about it. They’ll be really vocal again on Saturday. It’s up to us to make sure that we put on a performance and give them something to cheer about.”
One choice Redders will have to make before kick-off is in central defence, as Bellusci and Pearce are both available after taking it in turns to serve one match bans, but it will be hard to leave Liam Cooper out after his excellent performances against Charlton and Blackpool. The boss said that he has a good idea who he will select, but he has yet to make his intentions public.
Like many fans, I’m hoping that he goes with the Cooper/Pearce combination and I’ve said enough times already that Bellusci is an absolute liability. I’m just hoping that Redfearn doesn’t get any pressure from above to select the Italian. We may even take the field at Ewood Park with an all-British back four in front of Silvestri, as Redders has also been bold enough to restore Warnock and Byram to the side.
Some fans on twitter have suggested that Bellusci could make a good defensive midfielder, which would mean we could make better use of his ability going forward, while Cooper and Pearce would be behind him to rescue us from his defensive calamities. That’s not a bad idea, but who would be left out of the current midfield quartet to accommodate Belusci in that position?
Another dilemma for Redfearn is to decide whether Rudy Austin will be able to start, having played no fewer than four games for Jamaica in the last two weeks, even though it hasn’t been long since he returned from injury. At least Rudy hasn’t had a recurrence of his injury, but it must be likely that tiredness will be a problem, so it might be best to start with him on the bench.
Tomorrow Redfearn will be us against another manager who eventually got the top job after a couple of successful spells as caretaker, and last season he guided Rovers to a place in the top half of the table after their flirtation with relegation in 2012/13. And Redfearn was full of praise for his opposite number.
"It’s going to be a tough game for us, they’re a good side. He’s done well, Gary Bowyer. I think what they’ve done, Blackburn, is go through the process last season that we’re going through this season. His side has found its feet. It’s more settled, it’s more consistent and it’s roughly the same side week in, week out. They’ve got themselves in that position and it’s going to be a tough game for us, but on our day we’re more than capable.”
For his part, Bowyer was trying to get the Rovers fans going when he spoke to the Lancashire Telegraph. "These games are brilliant, ones I always look out for when the fixtures are released in the summer.” (We’re not famous any more!)
"They’ll be bringing close to 7,000 and they’re going to be making a hell of a lot of noise. That means it is up to our supporters to give us the backing they gave us against Reading in our last home game. They were phenomenal that day and we’re going to need the same again because there are going to be times in the game when Leeds will have a spell and, rather than get frustrated, we’ll need them to back us.”
Bowyer had been hoping to get four of his long-term injured players back into action after the international break, but it seems that none of them will be fit in time for tomorrow’s game. Jason Lowe (foot), Tommy Spurr (groin) and Josh King (back) Chris Brown (knee) are all still battling to overcome their various problems, so the Blackburn boss will still be unable to select from a full squad tomorrow.
It’s almost 12 months since Leeds went to Blackburn last season and took a similar large following, but the Leeds performance that day was a bit of a damp squib as we went down to a 1-0 defeat. Hopefully Redfearn will have Leeds fired up to produce something better tomorrow, but it won’t be easy against a Rovers side who could be contenders for the play-offs at the end of the season.
This season has also seen more than it’s fair share of disappointing away performances from Leeds, but I’m backing us to get at least a draw tomorrow.