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“there’s a quality issue” – Jesse Marsch on Leeds’ loss to Man City

Leeds United boss Jesse Marsch says the team’s loss to Man City on Wednesday night was down to a ‘quality issue’.

Rodri broke the deadlock just before half time for the visitors, and an Erling Haaland brace sealed the match. Pascal Struijk’s header late in the second half was just a consolation.

Marsch believes that the game would have gone much differently if Leeds did not concede in the first half:

“Well, I think in the first half we were stable defensively and we won a lot of balls. But then because we were a little nervy we were so quick to just give it away and so that was the message and was going to be the message at halftime, that we’re pretty stable. They’re having a hard time breaking us down the tactics of what we’re trying to do against the ball but we could stay on the ball and I showed a few scenes where when we won balls that they actually from behind weren’t pressuring us and we had more time than we thought. If we were able to get into second half and do that better at 0-0 then maybe we could find ourselves in a match. Then the second goal is a tough mistake and that now makes the challenge that much harder.”

Second half performance a good sign

Marsch saw the positives in the second half, where Leeds threatened City and even scored a consolation goal:

“However, then you saw us coming into the game more, right and this is part of the being brave is at 2-0 or 3-0, then you know we have nothing to lose. But what I really wanted to see us is play like that from the beginning, where we were brave on the ball, where we were making good dynamic movements and connections with the ball and trying to unbalance them as much as they were trying to unbalance us, but obviously there’s a quality issue in the match, and they’re very good and they have a lot of good players and it winds up being a little bit of a battle of attrition.”

Leeds’ next game is away to Newcastle at St. James’ Park on New Year’s Eve.

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