With every crisis comes opportunity, and for Archie Gray that meant he got first-team experience at land Road in the Premier League.
Last weekend, the 15-year-old was named on the bench for the first time against Arsenal.
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With the greatest of honours, his chance came in the wake of an injury crisis that crippled Leeds United and saw the Whites go down 7–0 against Manchester City and 4–1 by the Gunners.
But, what has been shown by the youth academy coaches in Marcelo Bielsa and the Thorpe arc is that Gray has the ability to follow in his ancestors’ footsteps and become a regular.
The teenage midfielder carries the DNA of the club. His father is former Leeds forward Andy Grey, he is the grandson of former defender Frank and nephew of legend Eddie.
And he’s backed by Victor Orta, the director of Leeds.
excellent at youth level
Archie is currently earning good reviews from his mentors at the youth level.
At his tender age, he is already playing U23 football and has broken out in favor of Mark Jackson.
And he has experienced the physical side of League One and Two of the EFL by playing in Papa John’s Trophy for U21.
An extraordinary assist for Amari Miller’s goal in a game against Tranmere Rovers left fans mesmerized when it surfaced on social media.
In early December, Archie represented his country – playing for England’s U16 in the Val-de-Marne tournament in France.
For now, she has turned down Scotland, opposite Eddie, Frank and Andy.
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director’s soapbox
The recent rise of Archie has got Victor Orta excited.
In an interview with Spanish YouTube channel La Media Inglesa, the director of Leeds praised the youngster when asked who could be the future of the club.
Orta revealed: “I want to be the first person on La Media Inglesa because in five years’ time you will be talking about this guy non-stop and I want to be the first and because I have the answer ready since yesterday.” Well, I want to name our youth team player Archie Grey.
“He’s 16 years old, [great nephew] Andy Gray’s son Eddie Gray and I want to say the name of Archie Gray at La Media Inglesa.
“You can find a good moment from the day he did in Papa John’s trophy on Viscout, he gave a lovely pass to Amari Miller in our 4-1 loss to Tranmere Rovers.
“Hopefully no one will take her away from us for God’s sake. No one is going to do that, she has [Leeds] in his blood. That’s why I want to name Archie Grey here because you’ll see him every time he takes a step forward.”
JUST LIKE AGUERO
Archie’s performance against Tranmere in September gave Orta goosebumps.
It also reminded him of a legend who has just retired, not because of the resemblance to how they play, but more so because of how Archie has burst onto the scene.
“He’s one of those players that you see everybody, I don’t know. I remember Kun Aguero and saying ‘What is this? It’s something that happens once in a long time, so I wanted to mention Archie Grey,” Orta purged.
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,[It] It’s only really happened a few times, in an under-20 tournament in South America, Kun scored 10 or 12 goals or something like that, you could see he was different.
“I saw Angel Correa in San Lorenzo when I was under 15 and it affected me. I saw Douglas Costa when he was 15 in Copinha So Paulo and I said ‘Who is this guy?’
“It’s only happened a few times. But yeah, Archie gives me that feeling. Archie gave me that feeling the other day against Tranmere Rovers.”
