This article is part of Football FanCast’s The Chalkboard series, which provides a tactical insight into teams, players, managers, potential signings and more…
He might come across as a Swiss Army Knife, but it looks like he might be missing a couple of tools.
Given the recent injuries to Liam Cooper and Jamie Shackleton, there has had to be a couple of tweaks to the team setup. As a result of these, Stuart Dallas has been moved out of his right-back position that he started off the season in and been shifted into a central midfield role instead.
Dallas comes across as a great utility player, someone who can fit into a number of different positions given the amount he’s had to play throughout his career. But as a central midfielder, he’s just not cutting the mustard.
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On the chalkboard
Dallas has always been more effective out wide, whether that be as a winger or a full-back. In fact, if you look at where his goals involvements have come when he’s been playing for Leeds, all of his assists have come when he was playing out on the left-wing, and all of his goals have come from the flanks.
Whilst he may be cut out to fill in multiple positions on the pitch, he just isn’t creative enough when it comes to playing central midfield, and that is holding himself and Leeds back.
He averages a 74.3% pass completion rate through his career, when you compare that to the other midfielders like Adam Forshaw and Mateusz Klich, both of them are pushing north of 80%.
For him to play in the middle, the £1.8m-rated utility man needs to be far more careful in possession.
The injuries to Cooper and Shackleton should have been a chance for Marcelo Bielsa to try out some new players in their respective roles.
However, he should have gone for players who are more natural in those spots, like bringing young Mateusz Bogusz or Robbie Gotts into midfield, rather than shoe-horning someone who just isn’t effective there.
Hopefully this Dallas experiment won’t be carrying on much longer, or it could end up with Leeds dropping more than the five points they have already from Millwall and Preston.
