The latest on Leeds United's free agent hunt

Latest on the free agent hunt at Elland Road with the YEP's chief football writer Graham Smyth and Leeds United reporter Joe Donnohue

Transcript

00:00What he wants is someone who not only can cover the CDM role but also potentially centre-half,

00:12somebody with experience, somebody who accepts that actually you're here in a supporting

00:16role and you're not here to be the main man. You are looking at a very, very small pool

00:21of players, really, really small, and it's still very much up in the air as to whether

00:29they'll do something. I mean, Farke is cautiously optimistic. He almost said he hoped to get

00:32something done in a few days, didn't he? And then set a deadline of, you know, a hard deadline

00:37of November, because if you haven't done it by November, essentially what's the point?

00:41Because they're probably not going to be much fit till December, mid-December. But he's

00:47supposed to be back in January, then you start to think, well, you know, what was the point

00:50in spending the money? So it does need to happen sooner rather than later. I kind of

00:54wish it had happened already, to be honest.

00:56You know, this is not somebody who's going to be coming in on probably anything longer

01:01than a deal until the end of the season, or at least that's probably what Leeds will be

01:04wanting. Yeah, it has to be someone who fits the criteria, fits into the mould of the squad.

01:11And also, I think a big one is financially it has to make sense as well. It makes very

01:16little sense to have banged on about finding the right deal for Leeds United on transfers

01:22all summer to then, you know, make a former Premier League player or, you know, a former

01:28European player who's played in Europe's top five leagues, who's without a club now, you

01:32know, making them one of your top earners because you're desperate. You know, it has

01:36to be a deal which makes fiscal sense from a Leeds perspective as well. And Leeds' need

01:41is very obvious. If you were a representative of a player who is available, you know, and

01:46there are very few of them who are available, suitable for Leeds at the moment, you'd not

01:50be doing a very good job by your client if you weren't going into that negotiation and

01:54trying to get the best deal possible, and maybe trying to play on that vulnerability

01:59that Leeds have at the moment. So it's not as straightforward as going, he's without

02:04a club, right, sign. But you can definitely see why it makes sense to take that gamble,

02:11even if they play very limited minutes.