Peter Henry
Preston manager Alex Neil has downplayed the level of analysis Leeds boss Marcelo Bielsa demonstrated during his now infamous press conference yesterday.
Argentine coach Bielsa has been the subject of intense media coverage since he admitted last week that he had sent a spy to watch Derby County train ahead of the two sides Championship fixture.
Bielsa called a snap press conference yesterday in response to the furore surrounding ‘spy gate,’ and proceeded to show journalists the immense level of detail him and his coaching staff go into before each game.
Afterwards, social media was awash with people calling Bielsa’s 70 minute briefing a masterclass. However, Preston boss Neil seems entirely unimpressed and has suggested that the level of analysis that the Leeds boss performs is no different from what every club does.
“The other thing that amazes me is people are calling it a masterclass. Every single team in this division does analysis on the opposition and have dossiers drawn up on players, fixtures and team line-ups. It’s pretty par for the course,” Neil told the media ahead of this weekends Championship clash at QPR.
“The general public and the media think we turn up, play five-a-sides and go home. So when you do get exposed to it and get a wee taste of it all of a sudden it seems groundbreaking, when everybody else in football is looking at it thinking ‘meh, we do the same.’
“It amazes me how people perceive it. I don’t know what people think we do day-to-day. If you look at most clubs and who they employ – Stoke, for example, have about five analysts. What do people think they do? They analyse games!
“It’s been that way for ages. Football has moved on leaps and bounds in the last decade. To get a PowerPoint presentation put together about stuff that’s pretty basic – and then the furore that’s gone with it – is quite funny to people in football, I think.”