Samu Saiz named Leeds United player of the month for October

Well, this was pretty unsurprising.

Samu Saiz was named the Leeds United player of the month for October. Given the results for the club in the month of October, in which Leeds won one match and lost five, it wasn’t as if there were a number of candidates to choose from.

From the Leeds United official website:

Over the past week, Whites fans have been voting in their numbers and Saiz beat of competition from Pierre-Michel Lasogga, Kalvin Phillips and Ronaldo Vieira, to pick up the award with a massive 78% of the vote.

A former product of the Real Madrid Academy, Saiz was a summer signing for Leeds from Spanish Segunda outfit Huesca and he has gone on to become an instant hit at Elland Road.

In October, Saiz netted a brace against Bristol City in the 3-0 victory at Ashton Gate and also provided an assist for Pierre-Michel Lasogga’s goal against Derby County.

Luke Ayling, one of the usual suspects for best players for Leeds, had a difficult run of form after being caught upfield on a couple of different occasions as the other team scored late goals. Similarly, despite looking great for his first couple performances, Pierre-Michel Lasogga had a Jeckyll-and-Hyde type of month, looking fantastic against Bristol City in Leeds’ lone win of the month, but looking pretty anonymous during some of the other matches.

Ronaldo Vieira did provide a spark during the matches that he played as well, but he didn’t provide the impact that Saiz did during the month. On a personal note, I wrote “Saiz was the only threat attacking-wise during the first half” one more than one occasion, and the stand-out image from the Sheffield United loss was that of Saiz dribbling past what seemed like the entire Sheffield United team while the rest of the Leeds players stood around and watched.

Anyway, well deserved to Saiz and good touch to have Toby Nye give out the award. You might remember that the club raised money to assist Toby’s family in paying for the boy’s cancer treatment during their “One Day for Toby” efforts.