Jesse Marsch speaks to the United Soccer Coaches Convention in Philadelphia

Marsch recorded an exclusive interview for attendees of "the world's leading soccer coaching event". The conversation shared here includes taking over from Bielsa, managing pressure, tactics and more.

Via a recorded interview conducted in late December, Jesse Marsch shared thoughts on “Life Across the Pond” with a full room at the United Soccer Coaches Convention last week.

It is perhaps worth noting: Marsch has many qualities and successes to rightfully claim with Leeds United. But the session came amid rising temperatures on foreign shores, where Jesse’s tenure could be cut short.

Leeds are 14th in a Premier League table tightly packed at the bottom. They’re two points shy of the relegation zone, having won just four of eighteen matches. Since the Premier League resumed post-World Cup, Leeds have lost twice and drawn twice.

The team has looked haphazard in those performances. Long-standing problems continue, and the increased number of vocal Marsch-skeptics seemed also present at the Pennsylvania Convention Center last week.

The conference is well attended by people from across the globe. And for the sake of documenting how Marsch is currently received, among the notes I jotted down from the session was this: “I am in a room full of British sighs”. I’m not sure I’d ever heard anyone literally tut before that session.

I think it’s worth noting that I’m not entirely convinced by Marsch myself. Though I accept the caveats of his most dogged defenders, and recoil a bit at the tenor of some critiques.

The conversation was moderated by Tom Shields, and framed specifically around taking over a program, which he specified from the start Jesse did in “a difficult time”. 

Taking over

Marsch took over LUFC facing a few difficulties, including that he was replacing a club legend, was new to the world’s top league, and that he needed to steer a team away from relegation.

The last point he managed successfully, barely. The first two points remain difficulties, perhaps.

Marsch began to relate his early days as a manager by saying that when he took over, he couldn’t believe how stressed out everyone was. He’d expected stress- knowing that the team had been tested “physically, psychologically, emotionally and in every way”- but, Marsch shared:

“What I realized when I first showed up on the first day was that when I looked at their faces, they were 10 times more stressed than I thought. And even when you see young people and you see real stress on their faces, you know that it's, it's a dangerous situation that you're entering into.”

His arrival strategy was a two-pronged assessment: “I quickly tried to analyze, tactically what was going to be necessary and then psychologically, what was going to be necessary”.

In regard to psychological necessities, Marsch said: “My first messages had to be clear about the togetherness, and the kind of team, the kind of commitment that it was going to be required for us to get back on track. I knew I had to be positive. I think that's always really important: to have enthusiasm, to exude enthusiasm, to be positive, to show belief in yourself and to help them understand that we will create a belief through our process.”

He also emphasized to the team: they had time. Marsch took over the final day of February, managing his first match in March, and emphasized to the stress laden crew that they had 12 matches to make it work.

The second session with the team was a film session where he tackled the “tactically necessary”. Marsch introduced 13 vocabulary words and quizzed them after running through them. Marsch listed counter pressing, rest defense, and making the last step as items in that list.

There was some discussion of adding information incrementally, as well as encouraging feedback and conversation from players in video sessions which he hosts with specific lines of the field:

“Even today, we had a video session with the backline. It was very interactive, and I challenge them to get more in those situations.” One wonders what was said and what is being worked on, as the backline has been a target of heightened critique in recent weeks.

Marsch vs Bielsa

One might imagine Marsch would be wary of comparisons, given the aura of devotion surrounding Bielsa’s name. But he did bring up that they were different, rather unprovoked. When asked about integrating his principles: