Why Leeds Should Go All Out To Sign Bristol City’s Aden Flint
Leeds United remain very interested in signing Bristol City’s 28-year-old centre-back Aden Flint amid reports that he refused to play for his current club recently. However, Bristol’s manager refused those claims.
Clearly the defender is itching to get away but where he would end up is not certain yet. Flint was born in Birmingham and Blues boss Harry Redknapp is also keen on signing him, something which may appeal given the location. However, Leeds are making big noises about going up this season and at this stage of Flint’s career, a potential crack at the Premier League must take precedence.
Flint had a very good season last time around in the Championship and is one who could bring some much needed quality into Leeds’ back line, despite the arrival of Pennington and the presence of Cooper and Jansson.
He is a central defender who, somewhat incredibly, scored 14 league goals in League One a few seasons ago and continues to be dangerous at this level. 5 more goals were added by the big man during the previous campaign, meaning he brings a realistic goal threat to the team, as well as great defensive attributes. That’s something which will attract him to Thomas Christiansen.
It’s always best to sign players when they are on the up and this is certainly true of Flint, who is on a steep upward curve right now despite being 28 and it seems these next three years or so will be his very best, something not lost on the current Leeds boss.
Pontus Jansson is an excellent defender, of that there is no doubt. But apart from him, there is no guarantee of long lasting quality in the centre of Leeds’ defence. Matthew Pennington is only at the club on loan while Liam Cooper has taken a while to come to himself and showed some real indiscipline towards the end of last season.
In an ideal world, the latter two would both be counted as back-up in a squad going for the title in this division and so that does indeed leave Leeds looking for a proper, permanent partner for the big Swede. This role is perfect for Flint and in terms of knowing this division, he has nothing to learn.
Time and again we’ve written about the need for squads to have a core of players who know what the Championship is about and so to have a centre-back pairing of Jansson and Flint would be a real feather in Leeds’ cap.
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