Leeds United chief executive Angus Kinnear has revealed that the club have no regrets after recouping £40 million in player wages following several high-profile departures this past summer.
The Peacocks underwent open heart surgery during the summer transfer window, losing some top players such as Tyler Adams and Rodrigo permanently and a whole host of players on loan including Weston McKennie, Marc Roca, Luis Sinisterra, Jack Harrison and Brenden Aaronson.
Meanwhile, new head coach Daniel Farke and his recruitment team tried to prepare the squad for the season ahead, signing some top-notch players like Glen Kamara from Rangers, Ilia Gruev from Werder Bremen and Swansea City’s Joel Piroe.
It was a summer of immense turnover but Farke can now rest easy, knowing that there will be no more outgoings until January at the earliest, allowing the German coach to focus on trying to get Leeds promoted back to the promised land of the Premier League.
Speaking on The Square Ball Podcast, Chief Executive Angus Kinnear admitted to being surprised by how many players didn’t want to play in the Championship after relegation last season [quotes via the Yorkshire Evening Post]:
“What we’ve seen is that players have absolutely no desire to play in the Championship. We thought we could convince them that this was a great project, that playing in the Championship and tearing it up for a season would be good for their careers and wouldn’t harm their international careers.”
“I’ve been naive about it but it’s been brutally disappointing at how we’ve seen players crawl over broken glass to leave our club. We’ve had a bad year but I thought there’d be a bigger emotional bond; there’d be a desire to put right the bad seasons they had last year.”
Kinnear also declared that Leeds United do not regret the majority of the departures, having saved £40 million in wages from players leaving the club:
“But out of the players that we’ve lost — and I think Daniel [Farke] would agree with this — the majority aren’t regretted losses for the project we want. We’ve saved £40 million in wages and brought in players who really want to be here.”
Writer’s View
It could take another few weeks for Farke’s players to gel given how much turnover the playing staff underwent over the past three months.
However, if players don’t want to be at the club, there is no point in keeping them as it would only damage the team and the dressing room in the long term.
