Can Leeds recover from Derby playoff defeat, even if Marcelo Bielsa stays?

Bielsa admitted his players gave everything for promotion this season. A repeat performance next year may prove difficult

Elland Road was loud and then it was quiet. Quiet enough for Pontus Jansson, an unused substitute on the night, to emerge from the tunnel, walk across the pitch to the opposite touchline and sit his crumpled body down against the advertising hoardings.

Only a few people inside the ground paid any attention to Jansson as he sat in reflection. Fewer still attempted to talk to him. The jubilant Derby County end that he spent his time staring at only noticed his presence as he walked back towards them with his head bowed.

“It’s never good to compare pains but for me it is hard to believe that someone is suffering more than my players,” said Marcelo Bielsa after the final whistle. And anybody who had witnessed Jansson’s reaction could see what he meant.

In August, The Independent did not promise Leeds United supporters success under Bielsa, just interesting times. Wednesday night was certainly interesting, in the way having your dog run over is interesting, or your first-ever colonoscopy.

There are now two questions which surround Leeds’ consignment to a sixteenth season outside of the top flight: firstly, what happens to Bielsa? The man himself had no definitive answer to offer on Wednesday night.

“As you can imagine, it is not convenient to talk about this point right now,” he said. “There is a process and you know about this process. If the club offers me the possibility to carry on I will listen to this proposal.”

Little new there then, expect the nagging sense that Bielsa is – as ever – telling the truth. He is the type who would surely guarantee that he is staying if there were currently any guarantee to give. For as long as there is not, there will be uncertainty.

The second question is the one raised by that image of Jansson, curled up against the advertising hoardings, wondering how a campaign where he and a team-mates reached extraordinary heights could end on a crushing low.

Leeds need to do this all over again, only better. Can they? While Bielsa would never rule that out, he admitted his players “could not commit more than what they have done. It would be very difficult to see all these players playing at the same level during one whole season.”

The most concerning aspect of Wednesday’s defeat will be the manner of it and how this promotion bid – built and sustained over 47 games – unravelled in the space of 20 minutes. Goalkeeper Kiko Casilla’s mix-up with Liam Cooper started it, gifting Derby’s first.

It was scored on the cusp of half time and only halved Leeds’ aggregate lead, yet Bielsa’s players looked wounded as they walked back down the tunnel. Casilla was the last off, pulling his shirt up to his face as he went, knowing that error could be costly.

Watching those reactions, it came as little surprise when Derby scored twice more and went ahead on aggregate after only 58 minutes. “We had 20 minutes of disorder,” Bielsa said. “I couldn’t imagine any solution.”

That may sound like a damning admission from the Championship’s best-paid manager but when you appoint Bielsa, you do not ask him to put 10 men behind the ball. “The worst moments for us were the moments where we tried to be conservative,” he would add.

This was the deal all along. No promise of success, no certainties or sure things, just at least one season under the stewardship of a manager who would impose an entertaining brand of football which had every hope of taking Leeds close. No more than that.

Elland Road, desperate to return to the top-flight, fully bought into that before kick-off on Wednesday night. There was no designated singing section, just all four corners making a tremendous din, in fear that this might be this team's only chance. It was loud. Then it was quiet.