Marcelo Bielsa has remained a cult figure at Leeds more than three years after he left the club. The Argentinian’s impact on the Whites can still be felt and the fans still love him. He took charge of a Leeds side in 2018 who were struggling to even be in the conversation for promotion and within two years they got back to the Premier League as Championship winners. His time at Elland Road ended in a bitter note when he was sacked after a sustained run of bad form, but that has not diminished his standing amongst the Leeds supporters. Stories about Bielsa still do the rounds in the city and more stuff has been added to the legend of the Argentinian in West Yorkshire.
Daniel Farke would go down as one of the great Leeds managers if he takes the Yorkshire giants back to the Premier League at the end of the season.
However, the German is unlikely to do anything to reach the stature Marcelo Bielsa has attained at Leeds despite not being at the club for more than three years now.
The Argentinian is a cult hero at Leeds for turning a middling Championship side into a side that finished in the top half of the Premier League in the 2020/21 season.
Players from that Leeds squad have a special relationship with Bielsa who turned them into a bunch of nobodies in the Championship to Premier League footballers.
Former Leeds captain Liam Cooper is one of them and the centre-back has further added to the legend of Bielsa at Elland Road.
Marcelo Bielsa used to do this and I have never seen anything like that – Liam Cooper
Bielsa’s legend has grown since he left Leeds and he is still remembered fondly by the fans and the players who played under his tutelage at Elland Road.
The Argentinian was a force of nature and bent Leeds to his will as he turned a poor Championship side into a Premier League side within two years.
Cooper stressed that Bielsa’s impact on Leeds was galvanising from the top to the bottom and admitted that while the squad that got promoted were not the best in the Championship that season, they played fearless football under him.
The former Leeds captain also revealed that Bielsa used to predict how their opponents were going to play and he was almost always right.
“He galvanised the whole club and took us from being mediocre to top half of the Premier League. We became fearless”, the ex-Leeds defender told the Daily Mail.
“Our Championship team that won promotion wasn’t the best squad but we’d take it to teams and fight to the end.
“Before games, the manager would predict exactly how things would pan out. I’d never seen anything like it, before or since.
“I played the best football of my career under Bielsa. I still wish him happy birthday every year and receive the occasional voice note, in English!”
Leeds fans will never grow tired of listening about their former manager
Whites fans will fondly remember Bielsa’s reign at Leeds for years to come and his impact on the club is still being felt, three years after he left Elland Road.
The Argentinian also shares the love for Leeds and recently admitted that he wished his reign at Elland Road ended on a better note than it did.
Can you name these past and present Leeds United players?
His cult status at Leeds is cemented and there is a reason why a road in the city is named after him, which shows his impact on the club and the city.
Bielsa will forever be the man that ended a 16-year wait to return to the Premier League and turned Leeds from midtable mediocrity in the Championship to a top half side in the Premier League.
Leeds hope to get back to the top flight this season but no one has and no one would do it the way Bielsa did it in the 2019/20 season.
