James Milner’s return would have been the easy route for Leeds United, but Jesse Marsch and the hierarchy would rather pursue youth with room to develop. This summer marks 19 years since arguably the city’s finest footballing export moved onto pastures new.
Now 37, Milner signed his latest Liverpool contract last summer to extend his stay at Anfield by another season. It remains to be seen what the veteran chooses to do this summer, but there have been no reports of a fresh deal as yet.
Marsch did not elaborate on his Milner comment with details on when Leeds may or may not have had the chance to bring the city legend back home. However, Marsch’s overlap as head coach with the expiry of Milner’s last contract would suggest last summer may have been their chance.
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The American was making a wider point in the embargoed section of his press conference about the challenge they have chosen of recruiting younger players with room to develop. Marsch would even admit it was a risky path the club had taken.
“We’ve built this with young players,” he said. “We haven’t gone out one time and gotten an experienced, 30-year-old Premier League player because a lot of what we’re trying to do is build a process where we’re going to get stronger and stronger.
“We’re not just building a squad for right now, but for the development of what we want this club to become, which we think is the right strategy. It would have been easy along the way to bring James Milner back or try to do some things like this to bring in Premier League experience or veteran players that understand the league.
“In some ways, it’s a little bit braver where we’re at in what we’re doing. You could say risky, but we believe in believing a process where we’re going to pick up some good, young players, get them at a price where it still makes sense within our budget and help them to become Premier League stars, help them take the next step in their careers and, in the process, build this club to get bigger and stronger.”
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