USMNT stars Weston McKennie, Tyler Adams & Brenden Aaronson formed part of brutal 'sh*t defending' assessment from Sam Allardyce before Leeds’ relegation from the Premier League

None of that trio are at Elland Road in 2023-24, with McKennie returning to Juventus at the end of his loan spell, while Adams has joined Bournemouth and Aaronson is spending the current campaign at Union Berlin. Their departures were sparked by relegation out of the Premier League, with Allardyce unable to pull off a great escape after taking in just four games at the helm.

He inherited a squad that was stuck in a rut, and did not hold back when offering an opinion on those at his disposal during a brutal first squad meeting. Patrick Bamford has lifted the lid on that chat, telling the ‘My Mate’s a Footballer’ podcast: “Honestly, he was brilliant. We had a meeting, we're all sat there, he's come in, just walked in, just stood at the front with his cup of tea, and just basically told us we're sh*t at defending. Just told us we need to sort this out. And that's what he did. There was no beating around the bush.

"The lads who didn't really know much about him, in terms of they'd been playing abroad or are foreign lads, are a bit taken aback. But obviously us English lads, who even growing up have watched him as a manager, you know what he's like. We're just like 'this is brilliant'. Tell it to us how it is and we can deal with it. It was simplifying it and just going back to the basics, which obviously last year we weren’t very good at. So he had a job on his hands. He definitely got us tighter at the back and if he’d been there a little but longer, we would’ve been fine.”

Leeds finished five points adrift of safety last season, with Allardyce picking up just one from the 12 available to him. United States international Adams, who captained his country at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, was among those unavailable to the vastly experienced former England boss through injury.

Leeds have, following a mass summer clearout, moved on to Daniel Farke in the managerial department and are looking to bounce back into the Premier League at the first time of asking – with the Whites currently sat third in the Championship table.