Leeds United have been dealt a recent injury blow forward of their Premier League opener towards Wolverhampton Wanderers this Saturday.
What’s the newest?
In latest feedback cited by Leeds Live, Jesse Marsch revealed that, regardless of having returned to coaching this week after selecting up an Achilles injury earlier in the summertime, the centre-back is not going to be obtainable for the go to of Bruno Lage’s facet for the Whites’ 2022/23 curtain raiser this weekend.
Regarding the present situation of the 30-year-old, the American supervisor mentioned: “Liam Cooper has had an Achilles problem from his low season programme from operating on a treadmill.
“It’s taken him a long time to get back into training but this week he has been on the pitch doing individual work, finally. He will not be available this weekend but we’re hopeful that by next week he will be in team training.”
Blow for Marsch
Considering simply how necessary Cooper was for the Whites final season, the news that the defender has now been formally dominated out of the membership’s first Premier League fixture of the season is certain to have come as a hefty blow to Marsch.
Indeed, over his 21 Premier League appearances final day out, the £6.3m-rated centre-back was in imperious within the coronary heart of the Leeds’ defence, serving to the Whites preserve 5 clear sheets, in addition to making a median of 2.0 interceptions, 2.0 tackles, 3.4 clearances and successful 6.4 duels – at a hit fee of 64% – per sport.
That meant Cooper ended the marketing campaign with the second-highest variety of tackles in comparison with centre-backs at Leeds final season whereas he topped the tree for interceptions a match, demonstrating simply how necessary he’s.
These returns noticed the Scotland worldwide common a extremely spectacular SofaScore match ranking of 6.99, rating him as Marsch’s best performing outfielder within the prime flight of English soccer in 2021/22.
As such, it’s clear to see simply how massive of a miss Cooper shall be for the membership’s opening fixture of the brand new season, with Marsch now being left with one thing of a headache at centre-back for the go to of Wolves.