Leeds United 2 Southend United 0
Leeds made a cracking start to this game with goals from both central defenders in the first eleven minutes, but after that we took our foot off the gas and coasted along for the rest of the game. We probably should have won by a bigger margin, but at least we’ve got the three points.
The only change from Saturday’s line-up was to give Beckford a start in place of Becchio, and the greater fire-power up front was much in evidence as we tore into a makeshift Southend side right from the start. And it certainly helped that we found a defence that was even worse at defending set pieces than the pre-christmas Leeds team.
On six minutes Johnson swung his corner towards the far post and Rui muscled his way in front of a defender to head home powerfully from six yards. We could have scored the second a few minutes later when the keeper couldn’t hold a Beckford shot from a narrow angle and there was an almighty scramble, with two more shots being cleared off the line before the ball was knocked behind for a corner.
This time Johnson played the ball short to Trundle, who returned the ball for Johnson to cross and a defender could do no better than flick it on to an unmarked Naylor. Our new skipper had the simple task of guiding the ball inside the far post, and boy, wasn’t he pleased to get his first goal for Leeds! My only gripe was that I’d backed him to get the first goal at odds of 20/1, so if only the two defenders had scored the goals the other way round!
At that stage it looked as though Leeds were going to go on and give them a right tonking, but somehow it never came off. We started to get a bit casual in our approach play and quite a few promising moves broke down due to misplaced passes, with wonder boy Delph being as guilty as anyone.
Southend seemed to be settling for damage limitation, but their cause wasn’t helped on one occasion when they did come forward, with Walker collapsing in a heap after twisting past Hughes into a promising position, and having to leave the field with a hamstring injury.
We did have a few other chances before the break, with Beckford lifting a shot over the top and then having a shout for a penalty, though from the other end of the stadium it was hard for me to tell if it was a foul or whether he made a bit of a meal of it. The only time we seemed in any danger ourselves came when Casper made rather a hash of collecting a simple cross, but luckily none of their forwards was on hand as he juggled with the ball.
The half-time record was from a Wakefield act called ‘Skint & Demoralised’, a name which would probably have described Leeds United for most of the last seven years, though hopefully not any more. Reassuringly, the track was called ‘This Song Is Definitely Not About You’.
We were still on top after the break and had chances to go further in front, but Robinson pulled his shot wide from a decent position and Beckford had a shot well saved by Mildenhall. I was starting to think it might be one of those games when the opposition nick a goal back and put our victory in doubt, and this could have happened in the 64th. minute. Robinson lost possession after fannying around with the ball once too often, and Southend’s move ended with another Robinson (Theo) hammering a shot against the outside of the post.
The tubby ex-Swansea contingent were definitely running out of puff by now, and Robinson and Trundle soon made way for Howson and Snodgrass. These two livened things up a little, especially Howson, who sent over a great cross for Beckford to be blocked by a Southend defender and see his second penalty appeal of the night waved away by the referee.
The third substitution saw Becchio replacing Beckford for the last six minutes, and the Argentinean was very close to getting a third with a powerful header, but Mildenhall reacted in time to make another fine save. Leeds had some bizarre moments in defence as the game moved into injury time, with Hughes whacking the ball across the face of his own goal and then Becchio heading just over his own bar, but thankfully these scares came to nothing and we held on for the 2-0 finish and the crowd could go home reasonably happy.
Except for me of course, as my other bet had been for Leeds to win 4-0 (at 18/1), which looked good after 11 minutes but turned out to be too optimistic. But the best news of the night was that MK Dons had surprisingly lost at home to Orient, so Leeds are now only six points behind the automatic promotion positions. Game on!