Highlights
- Leeds United will handle the potential departure of Wilfried Gnonto differently than previous players due to the absence of a release clause in his contract.
- The club must decide whether to reintegrate Gnonto into the team or sell him for a profit after he reportedly refused to play when a transfer offer from Everton was rejected.
- While Gnonto showed promise in his debut Premier League season, his mixed performance and desire for an exit suggest Leeds could look for a suitable replacement if the opportunity arises.
The latest potential departure from Leeds United will be dealt with “in a totally different manner to the others” however, the impending deadline of September 1st means the club will have to make a decision regarding the “quality” player soon, per The Athletic’s Phil Hay.
Leeds United news – what is the latest?
The last few months have been particularly miserable for the Leeds faithful, and unfortunately, things don’t look like they’ll be picking up too soon either.
The club’s relegation to the Championship at the end of last season was bad enough, but as they say, when it rains, it pours.
During their drop-down to the second tier, the West Yorkshire outfit have had to contend with a prolonged and incredibly disruptive takeover from the 49ers group and an exodus of players that just seems to keep going.
So far, the club have seen eight first-team players leave, with more like Tyler Adams and Luis Sinisterra soon to follow.
One of the reasons that so many of these crucial players have been able to just leave is because the club had agreed to clauses in their contracts that allowed them to either leave on loan or permanently should the club get relegated.
However, one player that didn’t have a clause like that is Italian international Wilfried Gnonto, who has reportedly downed tools and refused to play after the club turned down an offer from Premier League side Everton, per the Daily Mail.
This has left the club with more leverage in this situation but also means they must choose to either reintegrate him back into the team or take the money for him, per The Athletic’s Phil Hay.
He explained the situation on The Square Ball YouTube channel, saying:
“I think that is going to have to be dealt with in a totally different manner to others like Adams and Harrison, for example. There is no release clause. Our understanding is that he was going to train on his own now, and Farke, without naming him specifically, was brutally honest, I thought on Saturday in saying, ‘If I have this where somebody doesn’t want to play first, then he just won’t train with us, he won’t be in our dressing room he’ll be off on his own.’
“So that’s a scenario there, which means Leeds have to make this decision about what they do with him. Do they say to him, ‘This is what you can go for, find yourself club, and if they pay that money, you can leave’, or do they actually make him stick around [and], I don’t know, try and find a way to resolve this in a way that lets him come back into the team?
“Although I don’t think he’ll have been deaf to what was going on at Saint Andrews on Saturday, particularly with the away end.”
How much did Leeds United pay for Willy Gnonto?
According to The Athletic, Leeds paid FC Zurich around £5m to sign the then 18-year-old, in what was seen as a great deal for a young up-and-coming star of European football, a star that unfortunately looks like he’ll be plying his trade away from West Yorkshire if things continue as they are.
He wasn’t a runaway success in his debut Premier League campaign last year, but he did show enough promise and the odd glimpse of excellence to suggest that were he to stay at Elland Road and fight it out in the Championship, he’d be a brilliant asset for Daniel Farke to call upon.
In his 24 league appearances for the Whites last year, he scored two goals, provided four assists, took 0.9 shots per game, won one Man-of-the-Match award and averaged a match rating of 6.48, per WhoScored.
His underlying numbers are also a bit of a mixed bag, with FBref, which compares players in a similar position across Europe’s top five leagues, placing him in the top 4% for blocks and the top 18% for progressive carries, but the bottom 33% for successful take-ons and the bottom 11% for non-penalty expected goals, all per 90.
Ultimately, while Leeds and Farke would certainly be better off keeping the player former Italy boss Roberto Mancini described as “quality”, if he continues to push for an exit, and they can make a profit from his sale, he hasn’t performed so well that they couldn’t try and find a suitable replacement elsewhere, one that wants to stay and fight.
