Early Leeds United team news ahead of Burnley ft Patrick Bamford and Max Wober updates | OneFootball

FLW outline the latest team news ahead of Leeds United's clash with Burnley on Saturday lunchtime.

Leeds United go head-to-head with Burnley in the early kick-off at Elland Road today, with two of the early promotion favourites looking for three points.

It's Leeds’ biggest test yet in the Championship, and Daniel Farke will be confident that his squad is shaping up to be amongst the top sides in the division once again after narrowly missing out last season. He and his side have the chance to lay down a marker and make a statement to the rest of the division.

Promotion to the Premier League is the priority for Leeds this season after finishing third in the Championship with an impressive 90 points last season, and they face a side with the same aspirations in what promises to be a stern test.

Leeds and Farke took some time to get going this season but consecutive impressive 2-0 wins prior to the international break against Sheffield Wednesday and Hull City got their season kick-started to punch them into the top six early on i the campaign following draws to Portsmouth and West Brom in their opening two fixtures.

Leeds entered the new season with a full squad available for the clash with Portsmouth. However, naturally, there are going to be injury and fitness issues which arise over the course of the season, which has already proven to be the case.

A number of players have returned as late as yesterday from international duty, with the likes of Junior Firpo and Brenden Aaronson not back with the first-team squad until Friday, but there are other doubts in Farke's team, with question marks hanging over a handful of players ahead of the Burnley clash.

Here, we take a look at all of the early team news we know so far prior to today's clash with Scott Parker's side.

Patrick Bamford

A mini trauma in his patellar tendon at the back end of last season saw Patrick Bamford miss the play-offs and also training for much of the summer, as well as some of the pre-season games were disrupted by it for Leeds' experienced No.9.

He came off the bench during the first two games of the season and played a full 90 minutes up front against Middlesbrough in the 3-0 EFL Cup defeat, but has missed the last two league games after Bamford picked up a hamstring injury ahead of the clash with Sheffield Wednesday.

In Farke's pre-match press conference, he revealed that the striker is back in training again, and is available for selection, although Mateo Joseph will continue in attack. He said: "Patrick has been back involved in team training since Tuesday. We will still be careful with him. He’s not ready to play 90 minutes. It’s good he’s back in training. He will be important during the season."

Max Wober

Max Wöber is now suffering from a fresh injury concern after recovering from his early-season calf problem, which saw him miss the trip to Hillsborough against Sheffield Wednesday after he was also involved against Boro.

Wöber did not feature for Austria in their second international outing of the month against Norway this week, suffering from meniscus troubles in his knee, making him a "question mark" for the game against the Clarets.

Farke confirmed in his pre-match press conference that the centre-back is now a doubt for the clash against Burnley today. He is yet to feature in any league minutes but is unlikely to be involved from the bench in any capacity, albeit there is less concern for the Cardiff City clash next weekend.

Dan James

The other injury problem in Farke’s squad regards the fitness of Dan James, who was missing from the home game against Hull City with a hamstring issue of his own.

Farke has since shared “bad news” about the winger, who has aggravated and re-injured the same problem during his rehabilitation, which will see him watch on from the sidelines for around four weeks.

Interestingly, out wide is perhaps one of the main areas of the pitch where Leeds can afford to lose a player to injury and still look very strong, with Largie Ramazani pushing to start, whilst Willy Gnonto and Manor Solomon showed their quality in the 2-0 win over Hull prior to the international break.