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Like the greatest of entertainers, Junior Firpo left his audience wanting more.
After four years of downs and ups at Leeds United, it was announced that Firpo has left Elland Road upon the expiry of his contract ahead of an expected return to Spain to rejoin his first pro club, Real Betis.
Much like watching him pop up on the right wing when he’s supposed to be playing left-back, these last four years have been one hell of a ride for the cult hero who inspired the catchiest chant on the terraces this side of Mat Klich.
Firpo’s signing marked the beginning of a new era at Leeds United. The likes of Liam Cooper, Bill Ayling and Stuart Dallas had dragged the Peacocks from Championship purgatory to 9th in the Premier League under Marcelo Bielsa, and suddenly we were dreaming of Europe and signing left-backs from Barcelona.
After a season of Gjanni Alioski’s, erm, erratic interpretation of playing left-back, a proper number 3 seemed like an obvious avenue to improve Bielsa’s team, and Firpo was talking himself up as a traditional full-back who was so into defending he even had an eye on becoming a centre-half:
“Now I’m 25, I know in four or five years I will play as a centre-back, because the football is changing, you know, football is changing all the time. The left-backs now are more wing-back than left-back. So I’m not this type of left-back, you know, that makes the reverse and makes a lot of runs. I’m more with the ball, [looking for] the right moment to appear. So I know in the future I will be centre-back for sure. So I am preparing myself.”
These bloody modern full-backs thinking they’re attackers, eh Junior? Junior? Junior, why are you standing at number 10?
On second thought, Alioski might have been the sensible one all along.
Has any footballer been more emblematic of the last five years at Leeds United than Junior Firpo? In fact, has any footballer been more emblematic of the last twenty years at Leeds United?
After all the excitement and expectation following his arrival from Barcelona, it all became so familiarly dispiriting: injuries, poor form, Bielsa’s sacking, Jesse Marsch’s appointment, relegation, a play-off final defeat. Firpo ticked pretty much each and every box on the LUFC shitlist.
But then came the resurrection, made all the more satisfying because of the prior adversity. It’s easy to forget that Firpo was still being used as a punchline in the early months of Daniel Farke’s reign as manager. A knee injury at the start of Farke’s first pre-season in charge meant Firpo missed the start of the campaign as Sam Byram, Jamie Shackleton, Djed Spence and Cody Drameh (oh so briefly) took turns at left-back.
When he returned, the chants of, ‘You’ve seen Firpo, now fuck off home,’ started off as ironic. Before long, Firpo’s form was being taken seriously for the first time since joining Leeds. Four goals and ten assists in his final campaign confirmed his status as the best and undoubtedly most fun left-back in the Championship.
The last photo of Firpo on a football pitch in a Leeds shirt is one of my favourite and most gratifying images of a Leeds player ever:
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And he looked cool as fuck on the bus parade, too:
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Scuffing a penalty wide in a Papa John’s Trophy defeat at Crewe with Leeds’ Under-21s wasn’t particularly dignifying, but I’ll have to go with that awful, awful night at home to Aston Villa, as Leeds were beaten 3-0 in Jesse Marsch’s first match in charge at Elland Road. I’ve never been so relieved to see a Leeds player get stretchered off if only to save them from themselves.
Thankfully, the injury wasn’t too serious and Firpo was back by the end of the season. And as we quickly learned, playing full-back under Marsch was a thankless task.
The chant. The title. The long periods watching from the stands at Elland Road wondering where our left-back had gone only to eventually spot him standing in the opposition’s penalty area.
There’s a lot to choose from, but it has to be Sheffield United (A) and his role in inspiring a thrilling and pivotal comeback that will be remembered for years to come. As I wrote the morning after the night before:
Maybe it was always destined to end this way. Shortly before the hour mark at Bramall Lane, Illan Meslier got the ball at his feet from a goal kick and Junior Firpo began slowly ambling upfield while the rest of his defence recycled possession. By the time Leeds worked it to the right wing and Ao Tanaka swung a cross into Sheffield United’s penalty area, Firpo was standing on the penalty spot as Leeds’ makeshift centre-forward, meeting the ball with an ugly header that flew harmlessly over the crossbar. Firpo has taken his role as a false 3 to the extreme this season, regularly popping up on the right wing or as a number 10, so perhaps trying to transform himself into a modern day Lee Chapman was the only logical conclusion.
For all the LOLs that Firpo provides, it should never be ignored that this season more than any other, he really fucking wants it. In the summer he spoke on a number of occasions about his disappointment that Leeds didn’t let him represent the Dominican Republic at the Olympics, and ever since he has played with a visible determination that if he had to give up on that ambition for what could be his final campaign at Elland Road, he is not going to let four years of perseverance through injuries, suspensions, relegations, and play-off final defeats end in anything other than glory. It was written all over his face when he stormed down the tunnel at the Stadium of Light after Illan Meslier’s blunder robbed him of a winning goal, and it was there once again at Bramall Lane as, ten minutes after his initial wayward header, he made the same run towards the penalty spot and crashed Dan James’ cross into the far corner with a header that Lee Chapman, John Charles, or any great Leeds United goalscorer would have been proud of.
Either that or getting a TSB mug.
In hindsight, two years at Barcelona in which he barely played and only trained when Lionel Messi could be arsed wasn’t the ideal preparation for being thrust into the intensity of Marcelo Bielsa’s Leeds United and the Premier League.
Yet this feels more like a hypothetical for the future, and whether we will be asking in twelve months time what might have been had Firpo signed a new deal at Leeds?
Who knows, but right now it’s hard to imagine it ever would have got better for Firpo at Leeds than that photo of him in front of the away end at Plymouth, with both Firpo’s smile and the Championship trophy gleaming in the sunshine. That’s why it feels like a good time to say farewell. Not many footballers get to quit while they’re ahead.
This would have been very different had Firpo left Leeds following relegation — when many fans, myself included, wouldn’t have minded if he had. Like the rest of the losers who ditched United that summer, Firpo would have sheepishly walked out of the door with a cursory Instagram post written by his PR team.
Instead, two years later we got what might be the grandest social media farewell of any Leeds player (you’ll never sing that!), combining a compilation of his highlights with a voiceover from Firpo that suggests if ever there is another season of Take Us Home the producers should fuck Russell Crowe off and get Junior in:
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And there’s something about Joel Robles getting in on the comments that makes me enjoy it even more.
In his Instagram farewell, Firpo suggested he wasn’t offered a new deal by Leeds:
“This club has truly felt like home and staying was something I was ready for but that possibility was never on the table.”
But he has always been open about wanting to one day rejoin to Real Betis — which is yet to be officially announced — as he told Marca in April:
“Returning to Spain — well, especially returning to Betis — it’s an option I always have open. I’ve never hidden it. If I tell you that I’ve found it like a home here in Leeds, I’m telling you that Betis is my home. I’m a Betis fan, everyone knows that, and it’s in my blood.”
The move will mean Firpo is reunited with Diego Llorente in a defence protected by Marc Roca in midfield, which went famously well at Leeds. So good luck, Junior. You’ve more than earned it. ⬢
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