It is likely to require at least one of Leeds United's squad to produce a career-best tally to overcome the creativity deficit left by the summer transfer window and keep them up.
Leeds were at least one, arguably two attackers light going into the final weekend of the window and yet the deadline came and went without further additions to Daniel Farke's forward options. With just one goal from their opening three top flight games, a penalty kick no less, Leeds' ability to find the net enough times to stay up is the biggest concern they have right now.
Defensively they have looked solid in two out of three games and that was what they set out to be when they built their midfield and back line in the window. They ground out a win over Everton and a draw with Newcastle United, both at Elland Road, but Farke himself admitted that doing it for a full season without more firepower would be difficult. Survival in such circumstances, he said, would be difficult. So far they have not looked dangerous enough in open play, creating 1.3 big chances per game. That number for the quite frankly unbelievable 2020/21 season was 2 per game. Leicester City last season created 3.1 per game and still went down.
Scoring goals in the Premier League is difficult. So it has proven for newly-promoted sides in recent seasons but even those in the bottom half who escaped relegation last season averaged just 50 goals from their 38 games. Wolves only managed 31 in the 2022/23 campaign and still stayed up but Leeds wouldn't be advised to try it.
Looking at what Farke has been left with by the summer transfer window, the most obvious question is a scary one. Where are the goals coming from? Leeds do have players capable of hitting the net with a degree of regularity should chances be presented - Dominic Calvert-Lewin is not the most prolific of strikers but does have two double-figures seasons on his CV and Lukas Nmecha fired in eight in a single Bundesliga season for Wolfsburg. Joel Piroe's efficiency at Premier League level is a complete unknown but in the Championship he was the elite finisher. To stick the ball away, though, they will need chances. Therein lies concern.
First of all, goals and assists tallies never tell a full story because a striker might score an incredible strike from a poor quality pass or cross, handing a winger a scarcely deserved goal contribution. You can pass the ball to a team-mate in your own half before he sets off and beats six opponents to bend one into the top corner from distance, and claim an assist. They can be a bit of a false economy. Perhaps there should be some merit-based judgement before they are handed out. But at the same time, a winger might put three wicked crosses into the box and watch his centre-forward head them all over the crossbar. That's why football started tracking metrics like big chances created, Expected Goals, Expected Assists and the like.
Casting a glance at some of the transfer targets on Leeds' list this summer, it sheds light on how hard it is to consistently create goals in the English top flight. Igor Paixao might have racked up an impressive 14 assists in the Dutch top division but there's really no guarantee that would translate had he made the move to England. Facundo Buonanotte, admittedly in a poorly-managed struggling Leicester team set up just two goals last season. He did create seven big chances, though. Harry Wilson made seven in his best-ever top flight campaign but boasts just 14 assists from 123 Premier League appearances. Manor Solomon, in whom Leeds did not appear to show serious interest, has four assists on his CV from 55 top flight games.
But however it happens, looking at what this squad has managed to do in the past, it appears almost certain that someone at Leeds is going to have to do something they haven't ever done before to give Farke the goals he needs.
Leeds' final wish in the transfer window was a right winger who could also play inside. Failing to get one has left them with Daniel James and Brenden Aaronson as Farke's main candidates for the right hand side. Last season James' end product was incredible with nine assists to add to his dozen goals. In the Premier League his best ever campaign brought six assists. Aaronson has played 69 games in 'big five' leagues and from them mustered five assists.
On the left, £18m summer signing Noah Okafor had a nine-assist season in the Austrian Bundesliga but in Serie A his best tally was two in the 2023/24 campaign. Willy Gnonto helped himself to six assists last term in the Championship and will hope to improve on the four he contributed in the 2022/23 Premier League season. Ironically it is Jack Harrison, the player still receiving mixed receptions when he steps onto the pitch, who holds the best numbers in a top European league with the eight top flight assists he racked up for Leeds in 20/21. But that's a while ago now. It would be a turn up for the books and one hell of a redemption story were he to repeat or even exceed that number this time round.
Strikers can and should create as well as score. Leeds' centre forward options aren't exactly known for it however. Piroe made seven goals last season but as mentioned previously, he has no top flight assists to his name yet from scant experience. Calvert-Lewin's best-ever tally was five back in the 2017/18 Premier League and Nmecha matched that tally the following year, but in the Championship. In the Bundesliga he created two goals in the 21/22 season.
Further back in midfield Leeds are big in physicality and light on magic. Ao Tanaka, currently injured with an MCL problem, came to English football from the German second tier where his best season for assists brought four. The Japan international only set two up in the title-winning Championship campaign. Perhaps Anton Stach, with his penchant for taking set-pieces, will be the shining light in the centre of the pitch. He created six Bundesliga goals three seasons ago. Sean Longstaff had none last season but did once put together a four-assist campaign at Premier League level. Neither Ilia Gruev nor Ethan Ampadu have ever made a name for themselves in these terms, with respective career-best season assist tallies of two and three.
Last season so much of Farke's chance creation came from the wide areas and the full-backs played a huge part in that. Junior Firpo's four goals and 10 assists made him one of the division's most dangerous players full stop, never mind defenders, while Jayden Bogle scored six and made five. But Firpo is gone and in Bogle's 53 career Premier League appearances he has managed just a single assist. New left-back Gabriel Gudmundsson hasn't contributed assists - plural - in a single campaign since 20/21 when he boasted five in the Dutch top flight. In 136 games for Ligue 1 club Lille he only managed three assists. It's 10 years since Sam Byram could count his season's assists on more than a single finger and he has just one from 60 Premier League games. James Justin can at least say he's had a pair of two-assist Premier League seasons.
Central defenders are not judged on their creativity but they can chip in, perhaps with a header back across goal from a set-piece or a raking long ball in behind the defence. Pascal Struijk and Joe Rodon both have one senior career assist to their names, but Jaka Bijol made two goals in two different Serie A seasons. Sebastiaan Bornauw last matched that feat in the 2018/19 Belgian top flight.
Whoever it is that gets their boot or head or knee on the ball to send it to an eventual goalscorer, everyone on the pitch has a part to play. There is a reason why Farke is obsessed with the way in which his team builds their attacks and how they position themselves. To score a goal it might take one missile of a throw from Lucas Perri or it might take 14 intricate passes. After the 0-0 with Newcastle last weekend Gruev told the media that the second-to-last pass was where the issue lay when it came to creating chances. That comes down to a lot of factors. Players in the right place, team-mates reading intentions, decision making, execution, weight of pass and sometimes luck.
When any football club scores a goal at the end of a lengthy passing move, it is rightly held up as an example. You've seen the videos, with digits on the screen counting the passes before the ball eventually ends up in the net. A cynic might watch those videos and say it's all very well tapping the ball about in your own half for two minutes but at some point a piece of skill, an incisive pass or a strike at goal turns possession into danger, a clear-cut chance or a celebration. Without the last bit, possession is not something that will keep you in any league, let alone the Premier League.
At the end of Leeds United's phases of possession, be they prolonged or brief, someone has to do something right to create a chance and someone has to do something right to finish it off. Someone is going to have to do one or both of those things on a fairly frequent basis, most probably to a degree they have never before achieved. Someone must step up to be the attacker Leeds did not sign before the transfer deadline.
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