00:00So we have seen some footage this week of the players back in training, they're very recently
00:06back in, they're out on the pitch. One notable face, albeit very much in the background in the
00:13images and videos that we saw was Jack Harrison who of course has returned to the club following
00:21two loan spills at Everton, both of which didn't go down particularly well with the fan base.
00:30You have written in your newsletter this week, which people can subscribe to on yorkshireveningpost.co.uk
00:40forward slash newsletter slash premium, which is a bit of a mouthful and I didn't even look down
00:46to see that either. You've written about Jack Harrison's status and the potential for what
00:55could happen to him, very briefly without giving away what is in the newsletter for all the people
01:01who have subscribed already to it. Where are we with Harrison? Well he's back, he's a Leeds United
01:09player and like all Leeds United players he's expected to train. There was never any suggestion
01:14that he wasn't going to report back. We've seen that with a few players across the continent
01:18this summer when they're looking at getting moves away, they're saying I won't be coming
01:22back for pre-season training. That hasn't been the case with Jack Harrison. He's come back,
01:27his presence was very much soft launched by Leeds in the media clips that they've put out. It
01:32wasn't a look Jack's back, it was oh look who's in the background of this shot or the background
01:36of that shot just to kind of, I guess, have it seep out rather than make an announcement,
01:43Jack Harrison's back. It strikes me that there's quite a lot of awkwardness about it
01:48for obvious reasons. Fans in general don't want him back because he twice decided he didn't want
01:54to be at the club, once after relegation and then again last summer. You look at the terse nature of
02:02the statement Leeds put out last summer to say he was going back to Everton. None of anything that
02:09happened over the last two years pointed towards a happy reunion. It never seemed to be anyone's
02:14plan that Jack Harrison would come back and be a Leeds United player. There didn't seem to be an
02:18appetite on either side for that. But this is where they all find themselves so they've got to deal
02:22with it now and it'll be absolutely fascinating to see what happens. I mean we are waiting to see
02:28if he'll be on the flight list for Stockholm this weekend against Manchester United and then involved in
02:34the Germany training camp. I wouldn't necessarily say that that's going to decide his Leeds United
02:38future because we've had players, I mean, Crescensio Somerville trained in Germany last summer
02:45and was no longer a Leeds United player a couple of weeks later. You know, players can be involved
02:50right up to the start of the season and beyond. Jorginho Ruter started the season with Leeds,
02:57did not end the season with Leeds. So it's not a hard and fast rule, but we will certainly be
03:03pressing Daniel Farquhar on whether or not Jack Harrison is actually in his plans.
03:09I would imagine the way I see it playing out is that everyone at Leeds, including Harrison,
03:13will act as if he's going to play for Leeds until such a time as an offer comes in,
03:18either a loan that gets a big, big, big chunk of a very healthy wage off the books,
03:25or what would make perfect sense is a permanent exit and a sale. But we discussed that in the PSR
03:32position that is required in the newsletter this week. And yeah, let's wait and see on that one.
03:39Again, just sticking with Jack for a moment and again, without giving too much away
03:45about what's in the newsletter. Part of the issue now is really that aside from the fact that
03:52that he left two seasons in a row on particularly bad terms, he hasn't exactly ripped it up at Everton,
03:59has he, since he has left. And now he's found himself at a team at a very similar level to Everton.
04:09And he's already shown that, you know, he's not exactly been great in that position.
04:16So there's perfectly, there are many reasons for fans not to, not to be overly excited about him being back.
04:23Yeah. It's one of the real considerations in all of this is that he's not the player Leeds almost sold for
04:3020 million in 2023. He hasn't proven to be that player for the last two seasons.
04:35You can say in his defense that he was in a struggling team, but he'll be in a struggling team at Leeds.
04:41You know, that's, that's the reality is that Leeds will be fighting against relegation when they start
04:46the season, as will, I don't know, 10, 12 other teams, you know, they'll start the season thinking
04:51first and foremost, let's stay up. So he's not, it's not like he's going to be surrounded by the
04:58league's best players who will bring the absolute best out of him. It's going to be up to each player at
05:02Leeds next season to, to show that they can rise above the, the relegation battle on occasion
05:08and prove to be better than the opposition's players. And Harrison plainly hasn't proven that
05:14he can do that over the last two seasons. So that's not to say that he couldn't have a return
05:18to the form that saw him score five and assist seven in his last season at Leeds. Um, I think
05:23he got eight of each in the season prior to that. So in there is a player who can score and assist at
05:28premier league level, but it's difficult to convince potential buyers that what they're getting is a
05:362022, 2023 Jack Harrison.
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