Succeeding Marcelo Bielsa while overcoming anti-American bias was always going to be a tall order for Jesse Marsch. But the signs suggest the Leeds boss might actually be up to it.
On March 5, in the aftermath of his first game in charge of Leeds United, Jesse Marsch made – as you would expect – his first floating head appearance on that greatest of British institutions, Match of the Day. Leeds had lost 1-0 away to Leicester, thanks in large part to Kasper Schmeichel playing his bi-annual blinder.
What with this being a vast improvement on the 20 conceded in the messianic Marcelo Bielsa’s five final games, and having only worked with the team for four days, Marsch stated that he was happy with what he had seen, venturing that – for him, in his first game in charge – the performance was more important than the result.
What followed in the gloaming hinterlands of the programme’s final couple of minutes was some half-arsed analysis (Harvey Barnes was good, Raphinha should have scored), Micah Richards moving his hands about a bit, and Gary Lineker turning to his old mucker Ian Wright, and with a knowingly coy smile, asking him if he agreed with Marsch’s statement. “I’ve never heard that before,” replied Wrighty, in a way that dismissed the remarks as piffle. Much hilarity ensued. Scoff, scoff.
Leeds, Howe and Zaha are thriving but Rodgers, Moyes, Gerrard and Tuchel are all losers
Obviously, the undercurrent to this interaction, the unspoken source of the ribaldry, was that Marsch is an American. Or, as that great spokesman of our age, Richard Keys, referred to him when he was announced as Bielsa’s successor: “American citizen, two international caps, has worked with Ralf Rangnick and was assistant to Bob Bradley at international level at some point.”
Whilst there is an awful lot to wade through here (citizen, anyone?), the thing is that we really needn’t bother. Of course Keysey – Wokefinder General and renowned misogynist, eternally baffled by any managerial appointment whose name isn’t preceded by the word ‘Big’ – was always going to respond in this way.
So, too, his cuddly-wuddly partner-in-crime, Andy Gray, and many other of the old-school, men-at-it brigade of proper football blokes still on our screens and airwaves. What was illuminating about that Match of the Day snippet, however, was that it was not any of the above, but Gary Lineker and Ian Wright: two of the media’s leading exponents of tolerance,…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at Football365…