Marcelo Bielsa's plan and repetition take Leeds United to Premier League doorstep - Graham Smyth's Verdict

Repetition has been the key for Leeds United in their second go at the Championship under Marcelo Bielsa and it played a huge part in a win at Swansea City that leaves them on the very doorstep of the Premier League.

Pablo Hernandez, of course, came up with an 89th-minute winner that was pure drama, in a season full of it, against his former club and its significance was seen in the celebrations.

The coaching staff, the substitutes, every player on the pitch, their joy betrayed the importance they attached to this game and its result.

Bielsa, of course, wasn’t involved in any wild touchline jigs or knee slides onto the pitch, because he isn’t enjoying it. He cannot enjoy it. Not until it’s done.

The bid to make 2019/20 the club’s last season in the Championship was centred around Plan A from the very start. The same plan that very nearly, but heartbreakingly didn’t work in 2018/29, but done better.

Almost exactly the same squad, with a few additions, doing the same things but doing them better.

With three games remaining, they need just four points to prove once and for all that they had the right man with the right plan all along, that they just needed to do it better.

Promotion would prove more than that, of course, it would prove that this squad do have the necessary quality and character to supplement their obvious quality and tactical obedience.

Yet with Brentford on an almost inconceivably good run of form, winning every single game since the restart, the pressure and the tension will remain unbearable until the very moment the prize is obtained.

The Liberty Stadium was as noisy as a near-empty stadium can be, for around 75 minutes of this vital fixture. Leeds director of football Victor Orta and head coach Bielsa filled the air with impassioned pleas and encouragement.

Much of Bielsa’s output was simply a request for more. More of the same. And when the winner came, from a Luke Ayling cut back, it was exactly that. It was more of what Leeds have done ever since Bielsa got his hands on them.

The first half did little to ease the frayed nerves of a club teetering on the edge of history.

Having spent the first quarter of an hour spectating and contemplating on his bucket or his haunches, Bielsa watched his side struggle to build attacks with fluency or frequency and come under some pressure themselves from a Swansea looking to profit from the many set-pieces they were winning.

Bielsa’s vocal interjections began and only ever seemed to increase in volume and regularity.