Joffy goes north
This season was supposed to be his season, which is why Joffy’s cherubic face is still all over the adverts on the club shop at Elland Road. Instead he’s become another exhibit in the case against Leeds United’s mismanaged squad.
This loan move to Sunderland might work out for Joseph Gelhardt, even if it’s not what anyone planned and it’s not going how anyone wanted. Against West Bromwich Albion, the Mackems were every inch a Tony Mowbray team, patched together through injuries but trying to play good football, determined, enjoying themselves. At one point Jack Clarke sized up a cross field pass from wing to wing, and smashed the ball five yards into the ribcage of his unsuspecting teammate Pierre Ekwah. Once Ekwah recovered, the players and the manager had a good laugh about it. There was no pressure on Sunderland to do as well as they have this season, after finishing 5th in League One last time and coming up through the play-offs, but now they’re into the play-off places again and excited to see how far they can take their momentum. Mowbray’s got them backing each other up, grinning through mistakes, and seriously buzzing off beating West Brom.
This from Sunderland’s Luke O’Nien sums up the atmosphere: “A few people give him stick saying he’s not scoring but they can come to me and argue that because he’s brilliant.” He was saying that about Joffy, because this loan move hasn’t been easy for him. Gelhardt went there to play as a second striker off Ross Stewart, but Stewart’s ruptured achilles forced a change of plan. Mowbray has taken extra care with our Joe, making sure everyone knows he’s toiling in an unfamiliar role, praising him whenever he can, taking him out of the firing line for games when the simple size of the opposing Champo centre-backs would make it counter-productive for Gelhardt to even try. Against West Brom on Sunday, one of the supposedly more footie-minded teams in the league, you could see much of what Gelhardt has been up against.
Dropping deep alongside Abdoullah Ba like a couple of false nines, Gelhardt had more to complain about from West Brom’s midfielders than their centre-backs. He was fouled four times that were given, but that doesn’t include the number of times when he did his duty by helping the ball to a teammate and the ref played advantage, or the times he got kicked and got nothing. Two players were booked for fouls on him. It was hard to work out if West Brom had decided he was a soft touch, or too dangerous to be allowed to play, or he was just too quick for them, but any route was the same, and ended with Gelhardt on the floor. Unlike Brenden Aaronson, he was generally quite quickly up again.