Good Morning. It's Thursday 2nd January, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road Leeds extend lead at the top of the Championship despite dire performance Leeds extended their lead at the top of the Championship to three points after a frustrating draw against Blackburn Rovers on New Years Day. With Burnley drawing again, and Sunderland piling more misery on Chris Wilder's Sheffield Utd, Leeds have built up a commanding three point lead over the chasing pack, yet many fans are convinced they havn't seen the best of Leeds yet. Blackburn were happy to concede possession to the Whites as long as they didn't strike at goal, and the hosts were happy to oblige. Leeds build up play was monotonous; couple that with Blackburn's time wasting and falling over escapades, and it had all the hallmarks of a party political broadcast! The game sprung into life two minutes from time when Mateo Joseph was taken out in the penalty box by Danny Batth. The ground found its voice after Pascal Struijk duly ablated from 12 yards, only for the visitors to go straight to the other end and equalise moments later. Farke's players paid far too much respect to Blackburn, whose squad is only paid a small proportion of what the Leeds mega-stars earn. If they were unwilling (or unable) to go toe to toe, and take them on, perhaps they don't deserve to be earning almost four times as much (£31,109 average weekly Leeds salary v Blackburn's average weekly salary £8667). please log in to view this image Key injuries could prompt incoming loans Injuries to Jayden Bogle and Sam Byram during the 1-1 draw with Blackburn may give Daniel Farke food for thought during the January transfer window. The gaffer has already insisted that Leeds are going to have a very quiet transfer window, and has indicated that activity is likely to be reactive as apposed to pro-active, but with Max Wober and forgotten man Isaac Schmidt the only (semi) fit full-back's in Farke's squad, could we see a utility player come in to plug the gap? The gaffer is heavily reliant on wing-backs, not only defend, but charge up and down the wings, creating width, and moving defenders out of position. Junior Firpo, Max Wober and Sam Byram's injury records have always been a cause for concern, given the amount of time each has spent on the sidelines - severely weakening the starting line up! The club's decision not to strengthen this time last year (apart from Connor Roberts) played a massive part as to why they ran out of stream towards the end of the season, winning just four of their last eleven games. please log in to view this image Injuries dent Wilder's promotion hopes The Blades were without top scorer Tyrese Campbell, first-choice winger Jesurun Rak-Sakyi, and key midfielder Vini Souza last night as Chris Wilders outfit succumbed to a 2-1 loss at the Stadium of Light last night. News that Oliver Arblaster and Harry Souttar have already been ruled out for the rest of the season is great news for Whites fans. The duo were in fantastic form during the first half of the season, and helped elevate their team into promotion contenders. Without them, Wilders squad is spread thin. A 2-0 loss loss against Burnley followed by a draw against West Brom saw them lose top spot. They have now been pushed down to third place, but with recruitments expected soon, we shouldn't come them out yet! please log in to view this image
The blunts predicament shows the impact a few injuries can have on even pep has been bemoaning their fate due to injuries. One area of disappointment for me last night was the fans in the ground. I know sky turned down the sound but it sounded pathetic. Don’t understand fans bothering to go to games if they’re not willing to try lift the team when needed. What’s that we sing to opposing fans. You only sing when you’re winning. Maybe those at the game can confirm it was better
Morning all It wasn't the best performance but we were still the better team and definitely didn't deserve to lose. The substitutions worked well the game prior but yesterdays were strange, we lost shape and left gaps. Top of the table and a 4 point gap, a far superior goal difference, I would have taken that at the start of the season. I wasn't bothered about signings and loans a week ago, depending on the state of Bogle, Firpo and Byram we might need to act pretty swiftly if we don't want the wheels to come off
I'm just so glad I didn't pay money to go watch that game yesterday. I'm not blaming us for the event in general just Blackburn came not to play football. Look they defended their goal well but its a poor spectacle seeing a team camped and just waiting to dive for a freekick to hump it in our box. but to be fair they all do it now even on home soil. We huffed and puffed yesterday just couldn't blow their house down and when we got that lucky break it was criminal from us to concede straight after you can't leave the tallest player to head a ball back across the box. They gave 100% commitment in every tackle and challenge something we didn't I noticed yesterday. Tanaka shyed quite a few 50/50 balls. We just didn't test their keeper enough but its happened before and it will happen again. Everything has to be played to feet from us because lets be honest we are hopeless in the air. It's not the end of the world and we go again but I'm a bit pizzed off today it was a awful game against a ugly footballing side. I never want to watch any of it ever again its well archived in my brain already.
I’m guessing in the short term, Amps and Wober will get the fullback slots with Schmidt and Debayo/Crew as cover. Hopefully we’ll get another defensive body in to cover in this window. A bit surprised he took Solomon off, as I thought he was getting the better of things down our left, with Wober’s assistance. As disappointing as the result was, the fact we’ve only taken 1 point off these in 2 meetings is galling. Just glad we have a team that try to play the right way, rather than put up with watching a team like theirs week in week out.
Atmosphere was very flat yesterday. The expectancy among fans in general is the underlying problem. Fans just think they should turn up and watch us win 4-0 every game. The other thing some fans need to get over is that Bielsaball isn't coming back. I sat next to a guy yesterday that never sang, never joined in, just kept muttering that "going from Bielsa to this is a disgrace!" over and over. There was another guy behind me that just kept saying "this is ****, we deserve to lose!". Doesn't exactly make us "the best fans in the world" as some fans think. The fans did turn up the volume towards the back end of the 2nd half trying to make a difference which almost worked when the ref ended up giving a soft penalty.
Yep, a guy who used to sit behind us was always moaning about viduka...'lazy Aussie *#@!' etc,etc...when he scored all four v the Scouse, we turned to him and said 'spot on,the *@*& should have scored five today eh'....morons who would be better facing away from the pitch
I think we have seen the best of leeds this season, unfortunately we see the worse every three or four games later Farke can't get anymore out these players we have with his style of play and tactic . Top of the league though
Think we’ll stumble over the auto promotion line. In the PL though Farke will have to develop some tactical nous which to date he’s not shown he has any. His lack of tactical awareness hasn’t been too damaging so far due to the fact he has the best and highest paid squad in the division, but his headless chicken formation won’t work against better teams. He’ll be gone by the end of the year.
My thoughts exactly Forza, I think we may scrape autos but it's just so leeds to make the playoffs and draw Blackburn
That’s in no way good enough. I’ve lost track the number of times I’ve read we’ve best fans in the world utter nonsense and lots who attend games don’t deserve to be there. Social media keeps rehashing that cracking atmosphere from playoff semi last year. It’s a pity fans wouldn’t make effort to reproduce it every game
Sinfield was upgraded last year to CBE. You can't get another for 3 years so in 2027 he will be eligible for a Knighthood.
ah right never new that but its still shyte why on earth has Southgate been knighted? what the hell has he done to deserve it.
