Leeds United interim manager Sam Allardyce admitted that his team have “not been good enough” this season after their relegation from the Premier League was confirmed on Sunday.
A brace from Harry Kane as well as goals from Pedro Porro and Lucas Moura secured a win for Tottenham and despite a Jack Harrison goal in reply, Leeds were relegated ending their three-year stay in the top flight.
Allardyce took temporary charge of the club in April replacing Javi Gracia, but was unable to keep them in the Premier League having not won a single game of the four that he oversaw.
The 68-year-old, who revealed that he has “no idea” if the club wants to him stay at Elland Road next season, praised his side’s effort and pointed out recruitment as a key area of improvement going forward.
He said: “Overall, you need to sit down and discuss the whole infrastructure of the club, change what you’ve got and build on it. There are many things and many factors that need to be in place for a football club to reap long-term success. Most of it comes down to ‘how good are your players.’ These players have tried very hard, I can’t fault their effort. But as a squad, they haven’t been good enough. I hoped I could have got a little bit more out of them so I take responsibility for that but it’s a tough old world when things start failing.
“We’ll have a discussion next week at some stage. The last thing I wanted was to be the man who took Leeds United down. Even though I’m hugely disappointed, I’m grateful for the opportunity. What we’ve tried to do hasn’t been good enough in terms of results. To the fans, I apologise that I did not do better and the players did not do better and win at least two out of the four games.
“Talking general, general recruitment is the number one factor for any manager or any club to be successful. Without top-level recruitment, the manager are only good as the players they have. Actual quality is all about recruitment. Better players and more intelligent players make you a better coach. It’s a much easier responsibility to coach good players or great players. Because they get it. And they do very little wrong.”
A difficult season, which saw the club concede the most goals in the league (78), lose the joint-third most league games (21) and three managers (Jesse Marsch, Gracia and Allardyce) take charge of the club, ends with Leeds being relegated to the Championship three years after returning to the top flight in 2020.
The club put out a statement shortly after the game reaffirming their focus to achieve promotion back to the Premier League next season.
It read: “We know things have not been good enough, we know we have to improve, but please be assured that behind the scenes we have worked hard to ensure that the past will not be repeated.
“Our focus is now on how we get straight back to the Premier League.”
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