Everything You Need to Know about Marcos Abad

During Thomas Christiansen’s inaugural press conference, it was announced that assistant Julio Bañuelos, fitness coach Ivan Torres, and goalkeeper coach Marcos Abad will be joining TC at Leeds United. I’ve written about Bañuelos before, and couldn’t find anything about Ivan Torres, so now Abad will have the spotlight shown on him.

Spaniard Marcos Abad started his goalkeeping coach career after graduating from the University of Alicante. In 2008 Abad joined Spanish club CD Alcoyano and was a servant for the club before moving on to Elche CF after two years. Abad was the goalkeeper coach for Los Franjiverdes for seven years before joining Middlesbrough in February of 2017. However, his appointment with Boro was only a temporary one. He linked up with Aitor Karanka only because goalkeeper coach Eric Steele was injured, and Steele himself was the goalkeeper coach because regular coach Leo Percovich was injured. Nevertheless, Abad managed to work in the retirement home for goalkeepers with the likes of Victor Valdes (35 years old), Brad Guzan (32) and Dimitrios Konstantopoulos (38).

Abad is following Victor Orta to Leeds after turning down a higher wage from a club in the Chinese Super League to join the Whites. It’ll be interesting to see what he can do with the group of keepers at Elland Road. You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, so as long as Robert Green stays being Robert Green, Marcos Abad won’t have to worry about him. It’ll be interesting if Abad can finally push Marco Silvestri into the starting role, or whoever the backup will be if Silvestri is sold back to Italy. Bailey Peacock-Farrell is young, and Abad can have a fun time molding BPC into the player he wants him to become.