I have said on here many times that I am not a fan of the lone striker set-up going right back to the Chris Wood days of 2015 plus.
Recall reading how Bielsa once fancied James as a central striker for a while when at Leeds.
Maybe still an interesting option to provide a differing direct attacking route now too with James, as we have the wingers to open up space for him & it would give defences something to contend with pace wise ?
Its easy to see why Mo Salah would argue hes a winger too. At Basel, Roma & Fiorentina, Salah became renown for long direct runs down the right flank until Klopp encouraged him to move more inside to occupy the traditional inside-forward zones.
Was reading that Pep had tactically used 23 different player formats at Barca before deciding to use Messi in the similar sucessful inside-forward tactic too. This enhanced the Barca team eventually to an incredible effect with a lethal front three offering pace.
So, as Stoke City now go 8 games without a win in the Championship & Coach Narcis Pelach fighting for his job with City fans chanting for him to be sacked last time out when losing to 10 men Wendies 2-0, just feel its a game to be more direct from us as its quite a lively stadium to play in noise wise & they will be up for our festive visit, for sure on some zippy Staffordshire turf.
Stats for last 8 games state they are not being able to defend low crosses well, both the Wendies goals came from them with the Stoke keeper Johansson showing no command of his zones & rooted onto his line both times conceding easily - hope we have worked on that fact this week.
Stoke City have lost 1of their last 8 league games on Boxing Day (W4 D3), losing 2-0 away at Birmingham City in 2018.
Leeds have won 3 of their last 10 Boxing Day matches (D3 L4), winning those in three consecutive years between 2016 & 2018.
Leeds manager Daniel Farke has lost his last 3 Boxing Day league matches, losing twice with Norwich (in 2019 v Villa and 2020 v Watford) & last year with Leeds away at Preston.
Leeds have never lost a game with ref Stephen Martin in charge. We have won 8, drawn 2 of the 10 games in which he has been the ref. 🤞
Three points please Santa !



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