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How Marcelo Bielsa Plans to Solve Potential Leeds Defence Injury Crisis

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Following his press conference today where Leeds manager, Marcelo Bielsa, announced that Barry Douglas, Gjanni Alioski and Liam Cooper are all fit, but not 100 per cent, he revealed how he would counter-act the issue if all these players were unavailable to play.

If Douglas and Alioski, Leeds’ left-backs are both injured, then Stuart Dallas would switch over to left wing back, away from right wing-back where he has started all of Leeds’ league games this season.

In his place, at right wing-back would come Jamie Shackleton, another of Leeds’ academy products. Though we are more used to Shackleton appearing in a central midfield role, early on last season when he was getting a taste of football in the first-team we did often see him playing a right-back role.

We presume, therefore, that Leeds would still be playing 4 at the back, with Ben White continuing at centre-back and Gaetano Berardi coming in at centre-back to make up for the absence of Liam Cooper.

This would be the first time this defensive combination has had an outing for Leeds, which may cause concerns over chemistry as Bielsa looked just to be just about settling down with a regular back four of Dallas, Cooper, White and Douglas. Oh injuries eh?

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