Will Dodds

Fri 27 November 2020 17:52, UK

Leeds United boss Marcelo Bielsa said that he has “respect and admiration” for Everton manager Carlo Ancelotti ahead of Saturday’s meeting at Goodison Park.

Ancelotti’s side sit sixth in the table after returning to winning ways last weekend against Fulham and could move as high as third with a win against Leeds.

Bielsa’s team have also made a promising start to the campaign and the Argentine was effusive in his praise of the Everton boss.

“I have respect and admiration for Ancelotti,” he told his pre-match press conference (via Leeds United’s official website).

“First of all, he’s been wanted by all the best teams in the world. He has been chosen by some of the most powerful institutions in football which shows how good he is.

“The second thing is that he has triumphed everywhere he has been and the third thing is that he is a manager who is well respected by the players as well as his other colleagues. The last thing is that he’s never been criticised on his way of playing, it’s always an unselfish one and it is always valuable. To have all of this in one manager is not very frequent.”

Since taking over in December 2019, Ancelotti has done a good job as Everton boss.

Not only has his name and reputation helped attract some well-known stars to Goodison Park, but he has also looked to get the most out of the existing players , including Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Richarlison.

Everton are now looking to build a more well-defined style of play throughout the club and have become dangerous in front of goal. Only Chelsea, Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur have scored more goals this season than the Toffees, while only Patrick Bamford has generated more non-penalty expected goals than Calvert-Lewin (via FBRef).

The loss of Richarlison to suspension was evident and they lost all three games without him, but with the Brazilian back, Everton can certainly cause this Leeds team plenty of issues.

In other Everton news, the three players who loved Everton’s shift to 3-4-3