Leeds United youngster praise and Erling Haaland example as chief considers deadline week striker options

Whites boss Daniel Farke has used Manchester City and Bayern Munich examples to assess the Leeds United striker situation with big youngster backing.

Leeds are now in the final throes of the January transfer window at a time when Farke only has two natural centre forward options fit due to Patrick Bamford being out injured.

Joel Piroe has started United’s last five games in the no 9 role and 21-year-old alternative Mateo Joseph has not scored since the middle of October.

Farke, though, has declared he would have full trust in Joseph should he be required to lead the line in the event of Piroe joining Bamford on the sidelines.

The Whites boss readily admits his side are short of natural centre forwards options but highlighted the situations at giants such as Manchester City and Bayern Munich in warning that stockpiling strikers was not an option.

Farke hopes he will soon be able to welcome back another option from within due to Bamford being in the final stages of his rehab though the Leeds boss again vowed that his club would stay awake looking at other potential options ahead of Monday night’s 11pm transfer deadline.

Speaking at Thursday’s pre-match press conference, Farke was asked if he would be happy with Joseph leading the line in the event of Piroe picking up an injury at a time when Bamford was also out.

In a detailed response, Farke said: “I trust my players and whoever plays for us, if it's Joel, if it's Patrick, if it's Mateo, whoever starts upfront, I would always back him to score goals and make sure that we are successful as a team. And I don’t think it’s necessary to have six or seven striker options.

"I was a striker myself and I know how you feel so if you always fear, if you haven't scored after 30 minutes or 50 minutes and the flag goes up and you are substituted and then you have to wait three more weeks until you get another chance it's also not that easy.

"Especially strikers, they need backing and confidence and trust and also rhythm and also to know that sometimes when there is a game that they don't score or a poorer performance that there is still the confidence there and that they can play with confidence and there is still trust and backing there.

"But of course it’s a long season with 46 games and two cup competitions. We have at least the chance to be in one more cup competition to be successful and due to sadly the ongoing injury problems with Patrick, at the moment we have more or less two striker options there and if one of them would be injured it would be difficult also to have just one available.

"This is why I spoke about first of all that I really hope Patrick is back available pretty, pretty soon. He is in the final stages of his rehab and I hope to have him back in team training straight away but also to stay awake also in the striker position because if you want to be ambitious as a club then it could be tricky if at one moment we are just more or less one more injury away from then we can't really bring a striker into a game and I have to go with other options.

"But also if I have a look on the most ambitious teams in this league, in the UK, if it's in Spain and in Germany, I am also struggling to see their five striker options.

"When I have a look at Bayern Munich, they have Harry Kane, he plays and scores, if he doesn't score then Bayern Munich isn't successful. It's as simple as that.

"Of course, there is Thomas Muller, former German legend who can also play as a striker but this is more like the back up option.

"Look at Man City and Erling Haaland, if he scores they are successful, if not, they have a problem, so it's not that easy to have seven options and you pick someone here and someone there with really good striker options.

"Due to the situation with Patrick, due to the situation that we are ambitious, we are having a deeper look also what is possible and then we will see and the most important thing is also hopefully no injuries will join us. We deserve and need a little bit of luck.”