Leeds manager Marcelo Bielsa called an impromptu press conference on Wednesday to discuss the much-debated ‘spygate’ incident.
Bielsa has accepted full responsibility for employing a member of staff to watch Derby train ahead of their 2-0 win last Friday, although he insists he has done nothing illegal.
The EFL and Football Association have now launched a formal investigation into the Whites, who lie four points clear at the top of the Championship.
Bielsa issued a defence of his work, while giving an fascinating insight into just how much preparation he puts into analysing each opponent he faces.
Below is the full transcript from the incredible press conference…
Bielsa begins….
Bielsa discusses Lampard …
“Of course I have a point of view, but it;’s not important to other points of view. (Frank) Lampard says he doesn’t believe I have bad intentions.
“He believes that I violated the fair play spirit so I have to adapt to the rules that are linked to English football.
“Nobody ignores that all professional members of football want to work in English football.
“We have some conclusions, we have some analysis that says the Championship is the 6th biggest competition in the world. With very strong arguments.
“If the authorities want to protect the competition, condemning those who behave with bad intentions or those who affect the prestige of the league with their behaviour, they create a product with occupies the space it occupies.
“So we have to respect the procedures that are chosen and the sanctions on those who make mistakes.
“I regret to make the exposition I made now, because I don’t like to talk about me because as for my job.
“As I am overexposed to the media, I don’t like being in the media too much.
“But this explanation is important. When you watch an opponent.
“You’re looking for specific information.
“You want to know the starting XI, the tactical system they will use and the strategic decisions on set pieces.
“These are the 3 main axis that the head coach usually analyses. When you watch the activity of the opponent, you get this kind of information the day before the game or you confirm the information you already have.
“Obviously it’s not information that allows you to build a project which allows you to analyse the game. This is not the norm.
“I repeat again: I’m not trying to justify my behaviour. As Lampard said, but behaviour cannot be justified.
“And that he does not accept the explanation I gave. And he said the information allowed him to know how to train a team abroad one day.”
Addressing the depth of his knowledge…
“When I say that I know that people laugh at you when you create this much data.
“When you have strong data, it allows you to make a caricature of the one who is saying that.
“I am good at give others the opportunity to characterise myself.
“I will tell you the info we gather from opponent….”
(walks over to presentation)
Bielsa starts going through his Powerpoint presentation…
“Of each opponent we watched all of the games form the 2017-18 season.
“The 51 games of Derby County. We watched them. The analysis of each game takes 4 hours of work.
“Why did we do that? Because we think this is professional behaviour.”
He now goes through his analysis…
“We try not to be ignorant of the competition we play in.Tell me any game, point to any game. (19, says a journalist)
“This is the analysis of the game. Both starting teams. All the data of the game, taking into the account the tactical scheme of the opponent.
“Would you like to see another game? (number 12, Man United vs Derby)
“I’m trying to convince you what I said is true. This is the same analysis.
“We watch the players in the 51 games, those who are still playing for Derby County.
“The other thing we do is point out the chances to score, the half chances to score and which team dominates every five minutes.
“That’s why it takes 4 hours to analyse each game. This is not very useful.
“It doesn’t put you in better conditions to win a game. But the way to respect the way football receives you is to make the effort to know the players and the teams.”
More analysis….
“I can’t speak English, but I can speak about the 24 teams of the Champonship.
“The only goal of this is to see what were the positions of the players still in Derby from last year.
“We also do video analysis where we register the goals, chances, and that’s why it takes four hours to analyse the game.
“It’s a process, a way to get to know the opponent.
“This document allows us to know if one player has missed some games, if another has played or missed games.
“We see for example, he played against us then not anymore and we can express all these parameters with this graphic.
“I feel ashamed to have to tell you all this.
“Let’s talk about the analysis that Derby played this season.
“They played 31 games. 49% they used a 4-3-3 system with No 8 on the right.
“In 22% a 4-3-3- but with the No 8 on the left.
“Same for the 4-2-1-3, with the no 8 on the right and left.
“They also used structures, 3%, 2%, but they’re not significant.
“Before the game we knew perfectly that they would use these kind of systems.”
Bielsa continues with his coaching masterclass…
“These structures gives you fixed priorities and we here have the minutes and the games to understand why Derby changes the system and when.
“If they change the system to keep a result or to try to score.
“We also analyse if the changes are to give an offensive profile to the team or to give defensive strength. And if these changes work or not.
“We also gather this kind of information. The structures Derby play against.
“Why do we look at this? The idea is to try to observe what is the most difficult structure for them to face?
“I would to explain that all this information, I don’t memorise it. All the information that this report has responds to the questions I have asked myself over the last 30 years.
“If you ask me the most difficult system for Derby to play against, I don’t have it in my mind.
“I can ask and look at the document. I know I have the answer.
“How do we gather all this information. From the analysis if the 31 game.
“Give me a number please. I’m doing this because I consider you don’t believe me.
“I want to give you factual elements to convince you I’m telling the truth.
“Give me a number of I’ll carry one. (number 27 – vs Bristol City).
“This is the tactical analysis. This is the document. Have a look. The analysis of chances, goals, domination.
“We see in each segment of 5 minutes, who dominates and if they create chances.”
Video analysis begins…
“Now lets have a look at the video of this game. We know what this player will do when he raises both hands. I know that and so do all the Championship head coaches.
“This same game, in order to make our players understand it, we put the name of each player – a player cannot watch more than 10 or 15 minutes.
“If you don’t help a player with the rivals name, you cannot analysis each player .(shows video)
“As you can see, you have 40 minutes of offensive action from Derby from 31 games. When you see 41 minutes of attack, you see what is the path for the opponent to attack.
“And if you do the same thing analysing what were the chances considered by Derby County, you see the defensive weaknesses that they do.
“Our goal is to sum up in 7 or 8 minutes to show to the player how Derby attack.
“We also make a 7 or 8 minutes video showing the defensive weaknesses.
“The goal of this analysis is to allow our players to have an idea of the opponent in 15 minutes.
“We know Derby for 90% of the game use four systems. Here we have a table where we see each of these four systems.
“We see who plays in the 4-3-3. In red we have the usual starters and the second players are the subs and the third or fourth players play less.
“If you want to have synthesis of the 31 games of Derby, we have them in this document.
“For the 5th system we use, we also have this document. This is another way to see the same information on this document.”
Player analysis now starts…
“Now let’s look at the tactical analysis.
“These are the players who play in different positions. These are the four basic systems.
“We look at each player and I know how many minutes each player plays in each position.
“Lets look at each player. He played 1,772 minutes as a left back and 70 minutes as a left winger.
“This player played as a left offensive midfielder, as a no 8 on the left and on the right, a no 4 on the centre right, as left winger and as winger-midfielder on the right.
“With this info we know his main positions are the first three.
“Another player. (Harry) Wilson. He plays as a right and left winger and as an offensive midfielder on the left.
“All the data we can have, we have on a document and we know about his past. This document allows us to understand the question we have.
“These are the goalkeepers, the right-backs, the left-backs. This is the centre-back on the right and on the left. We do this for each position.
“We analyse each position. Let’s look at the wingers.
“Against Derby, Alioski played as a left-back. So who could play against him? No 20, 11, 7 and the player who played the least at the end of the day, played the game actually.
“So this is a no 9, plays on the left and on the right.”
“To sum up, these are the players and we have the position which they played.
These are the players that were at Derby last year, the left foot players and it’s easier to just focus on the left.
We gather information for the systems, we analyse to see which player goes in which system. ”
Why did you sent someone to watch Derby training then?
“I don’t need to watch a training session to know where they play. Why do I go?
“Because it’s not forbidden, I didn’t know it would create such a reaction and even though going and watching an opponent is not useful, it allows me to keep my anxiety low.”
Now a story about Pep Guardiola!
“I’m going to tell you a story. When I was Bilbao coach, we played the final against Barcelona, who won 3-0. They were generous with us because after the third goal they stopped playing.
“I was very sad to lose this game. When the game finished I sent it to (Pep) Guardiola, this analysis as a gift expressing my admiration for him.
“He told me ‘you know more about Barcelona than me.’
“But it was useless because they scored three goals against us. I do this to feel well, I see that this information does not allow you to win games.
“Half of the goals we conceded are from set pieces. if the spying was effective, we would have found a solution on this subject. But it was not useful at all for us.
“Here we have the analysis for all teams [points to rows of folders]. This is this season, this for last season.
“This is for the friendlies. We went to watch the opponent.
“What I want to tell you is that I want to be judged for my intentions. I don’t need the information I gather. In my eyes, I feel I am innocent.
“I don’t feel I’m trying to get a moral advantage. I feel I have done something not forbidden.
“I don’t have bad intentions. Is this right? No, I don’t say that. But we have to analyse the behaviours, taking into account the intentions of the person behaving this way.”