Kalvin Phillips
Since the 15th of June 2018, there will be few players worldwide who are happier with their career’s since. Prior to this day Phillips was a young player struggling to find a place in his boyhood team and underperforming when given chances by Thomas Christiansen and Paul Heckingbottam. It was on this day though that Leeds changed head coach and brought in Marcelo Bielsa. This began a transformation for the young player who was now the teams central defensive midfielder and has improved consistently since now a Premier League and England midfielder.
In an attacking transition Kalvin is crucial to transitioning a Leeds possession into a Leeds chance by receiving the ball from a defender before either recycling this possession or hopefully turning and playing a fast vertical pass upfield to players in between the opposition lines creating confusion and disorganizing a defense. When Leeds are in the extended phases pf an attack Phillips will often drop into a center back position to create the famous Bielsa 3–3–1–3. This defensive positioning change allows the full backs to push higher up the pitch as they have more cover behind them. Defensively Phillips actively looks to step out and make interceptions however he can also be used to mark any players who are left unmarked by other Leeds players around their own box
Phillips’ can often seem perfect for this position, not only does it compliment and allow his strengths to shine it also hides his weaknesses.
Strengths
The first and most notable strength of Phillips is his passes, not only does Kalvin have a large range of passing often capable of 50+ yard passes to kickstart attacks he can also do this with both feet, this is evidenced by his 86.2% passing accuracy this season in the premier league.
Phillips second strength is his dribbling although not a player you would want in a take-on only completing 0.6 per game this is a perfect example of how he is suited to his position. He is very good at turning with the ball to create space and keeping possession, this gives him time to pick out a pass and generate forward momentum. A stat to represent this fact is how little he is dispossessed per game losing the ball 0.7 times every game. This could also be a combination of his calmness on the ball which is blatant to anyone watching him.
Lastly the Leeds born player is also extremely capable defensively making 2.9 tackles per game and 1.7 interceptions per match, One thing that is often not mentioned about these is that most tackles made are against counter attacking teams who are attacking at pace. Kalvin is capable of both standing and sliding tackles whether being able to stop a player trying to take him on or to place a highlight reel tackle on players sprinting at his defense.
Weaknesses
As an England international obviously his weaknesses are few and far between however there are two major issues with his game, Firstly his attacking output is very low, this isn’t significant as of right now because of how deep he plays in the Leeds team but it could become an problem in a different role. One argument to this could be that he can play centre back so not to consider him as an attacking player however as a midfielder this isn’t something he will broadcast.
Lastly Phillips can be prone to make overly aggressive tackles when his team aren’t doing well and can leave himself prone to fouling the opponent or collecting bookings. Two examples of this was the late yellow card vs Tottenham in a game that was already lost, this got him suspended from Leeds’ next fixture and could be blamed for the loss of that following fixture.
To summarize Phillips would be one of the first names right now to come to mind when asked about the best defensive midfielders in world football, both technically and tactically he is performing at an exceptional level for Leeds right now with very little severe problems to his game.