Manchester United 0-1 Leeds United

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By Barky Satfastard
January 3 2010
An FA Cup banana skin was always a possibility today as the in-form League One leaders, Leeds United travelled across the Pennines to face an irrelevant team of has-beens and journeymen from the Greater Liverpool area. Happily for Leeds, a Jermaine Beckford goal spared them the embarrassment of another “Histon” and booked a fourth round trip to Tottenham Hotspurs.

As expected, Leeds dominated from the start and the only real surprise was that it took a full 19 minutes to get the goal that their vastly superior play deserved. A beautiful long ball from Howson completely foxed the criminally unintelligent Wes Brown and Beckford took it in his stride and fooled defenders and commentators alike as he appeared to push it too far wide; before deftly cutting the ball into the bottom right hand corner of the goal. Lucciano Becchio could have made it 2-0 moments later, but placed a header marginally over the bar – though in fairness to Becchio, this was probably out of politeness to the hosts, who were, after all, facing one of the biggest matches in their history.

Leeds then took their foot off the gas and allowed the home team a bit of possession over the remainder of the first half and almost conceded a shock equaliser as a Wayne Rooney effort was cleared off the line by Jason Crowe.

At half-time you could forgive Simon Grayson for instructing his team to keep the game at a low tempo for the second half, particularly as we have such a big match coming up next weekend against Wycombe Wanderers - though this laid-back approach would threaten to prove costly once or twice as the second half wore on.

There were indeed two – maybe three – incidents when our goalkeeper, Caspar Ankergren, actually had to touch the ball and the home crowd were even starting to sense that the minnows might be able to stage a come-back – the ridiculous fools. Leeds, meanwhile, attempted to reassert their dominance with the two best chances of the second period: a Jermaine Beckford effort that went narrowly wide and a Robert Snodgrass free kick that cannoned off the crossbar.

The game mimbled out to a finish and a rather lack-lustre Leeds eventually trudged home to their expected 1-0 victory - though it was evident throughout the tie that the Leeds players had their minds firmly on next week's big match against Wycombe. Full credit to the underdogs though - they battled hard and tried their best to take advantage of the fact that Leeds were below par. They did their best and have no reason to be ashamed of the fact that they were played off the park in every single department, by a team that barely got out of first gear, by its usual standards. As a final footnote, their manager, Sir Alex Flatulence, expressed his disappointment that there had only been 5 minutes and 48 seconds of added time at the end of the second half. I'm sure I'm not the only person who really hopes he catches his k-nob in his flies.

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3 Jan, 2010 23:11

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