MAYBE Marcelo Biesla knows more about football than the rest of us. There was episodic confusion last season as the Leeds manager stuck with Patrick Bamford as the focal point of the club’s attack in the Championship. It was sort of working, because Leeds were on their way to the league title and a long-awaited return to the Premier League, but it was sort of not working because Bamford was putting in one of the most wasteful seasons seen in the Expected Goals era.
Bamford had non-penalty chances worth more than 25 goals last season (itself an indication of how dominant his team were), but only scored with 14 of them. Check out the mass of squandered opportunities in and around the penalty spot, a sea of yellow. The Championship might be the spiritual home of the lunge and late block by 28-year-old central defenders but even so, someone of Bamford’s poise should have tucked at least a few more of them home.
Whether people were basing their view on the admittedly stark evidence above, or whether it was an old-fashioned hunch from watching Bamford’s finishing with their eyes, the common view at the start of this campaign was that Bielsa’s loyalty to his striker was deeply misplaced and that if he struggled to convert good chances in the Championship then how on earth was he going to be able to do it in the mighty Premier League? Six goals in his first six appearances was Bamford’s answer and he has barely slowed down since, a quiet January aside.
A blond lone striker with myriad aspects to his game has inevitably led to the question: is Bamford the new Harry Kane? Could he be the man to deputise for the England captain if/when he gets injured again? Well It’s hard to argue the Leeds man can be a *new* Kane as he is only two months younger than the Tottenham man. More of a firmware upgrade or expansion pack than a new version, but the two players are remarkably analogous, even if Bamford plays more like the Harry Kane of two seasons ago, before Kane discovered the productive possibilities of dropping into the pocket and looking for wide receivers. Kane and Bamford average 3.8 and 3.7 shots per 90 respectively in the Premier League this season but Kane only 2.4 in the penalty area, compared to 3.3 for Bamford. The map below shows just how confined Bamford has been to the 18-yard box, although he did score from the D as part of his hat-trick at Villa Park. His total of 11 goals is pretty much in line with the xG, which normally, with most players, wouldn’t raise an eyebrow but once again in the context of what transpired last season is a genuinely remarkable trend.
The leap from the Championship to the Premier League is supposed to be the ultimate step up in class, the Rubicon of pace, power and passion. West Brom and Fulham are doing their best to prove that this is still the case but Leeds are virtually assured of survival already and that is because they have a system that works, a manager who trusts his players to carry it out and a striking figurehead who finishes it off. Kane and Bamford both had to endure a number of loan spells as young players, some of which worked, some of which didn’t. Kane was lucky to hit his stride three or four years sooner than Bamford but the benefit of that to the Leeds man is that he is considerably fresher and more underplayed than Kane and many of his other contemporaries. Which given how he is utilised by Bielsa, is probably for the best.
Bamford 19-20: 16 goals from 143 shots
Bamford 20-21: 6 goals from 22 shots"I'd like to see Harry Kane do it in the Championship"
— Duncan Alexander (@oilysailor) October 23, 2020
In a week when Leeds fans have been basking in the aesthetic pleasure of seeing Raphinha nutmeg Gary Cahill it begs the question: what is the point of football? No one can deny the visual joy of seeing a yellow Nike Flight go through someone’s legs but at the same time Cahill has won the Premier League twice, the FA Cup twice, the EFL Cup, the Champions League and the Europa League twice. The Big Five. Lots of players don’t come close to an honours board like Cahill’s, though, including Harry Kane. Bamford is one up on him as it stands, although Kane could level in the Carabao Cup Final in April. The tantalising thought is both men combining to help England to win the Euros this summer, and Gareth Southgate must surely have thought about this in recent weeks. If Bamford can maintain his attacking performance for the next three months then at the very least he’ll be the ideal understudy to the England captain. The new Harry Kane? No, assistant *to* the Harry Kane.
