Tony Masibo
Leeds United are 90 minutes away from the drop zone after losing 3-0 to Chelsea at Elland Road on Wednesday night.
The Whites were reduced to 10 men after Daniel James was shown red in the opening 24 minutes for a foul on Mateo Kovacic.
James’ red card forced head coach Jesse Marsch to a little bit tweak his starting line-up, but the trick did not go well as the Blues took advantage and collected easy points away from home.
However, Marsch did not blame James for receiving the marching orders that perhaps came to haunt the entire Leeds team on the night.
He said: “Obviously we’ve had two tackles in the last two games that are a little bit crossing the line and hurt the team.
“But I’m not going to blame or finger point to any of our players because they have given everything they can. They are so committed and they deserve more.
“I’m just trying to do everything I can to help them to earn it.
“First I felt it wasn’t a red, I haven’t seen it yet but I was told it was a red. Dan said he didn’t mean to do it, he was just trying to be aggressive and win the ball, and it caught him in a bad way.
“We want to be aggressive but certainly not cross the line. We have to be aggressive against the ball, try to win balls and sometimes we’ve now been too aggressive in certain situations and that has cost us.”
On the remaining two demanding fixtures for Leeds, Marsch said;
“We want to learn from these moments so we don’t repeat these kinds of situations and mistakes.
“We have six points left. We have to do everything we can to stay mentally strong.”
Leeds must now win the remaining two fixtures, at home against Brighton and Brentford away to secure a place in next season’s English Premier League.
