Leeds United came so close to pulling off an amazing victory, coming back from 2-0 down on,y to be denied all three points with a late Watford leveller.

There always seems to be drama in these encounters between the whites' and the hornets. Last season, a bizarre encounter saw Leeds reduced to nine-men and go down 6-1 at Elland Road although revenge was attained on the final day of the season when our 2-1 win at Vicarage Road denied Watford an automatic promotion spot.

Tom Lees sat out injured so Sam Byram was recalled to right-wing-back, Lee Peltier switched to the centre of defence. Leeds started the brighter, a header from Smith tested Bond , Zaluikas headed over the bar and Murphy blazed the ball over from a rebound Austin from a blistering effort.

However Troy Deeney opened the scoring on 12 minutes, having gone close with a header moments earlier he capitalised on some good running by McGuigan and slotted the ball home past Kenny's grasp inside the near post.

There were chances at both ends and I and no doubt the majority of Leeds fans inside the stadium feared the worse on the stroke of half time when Watford doubled their advantage, a rapid, mass-manned counter attack saw the ball break loose to Battocchio who picked his spot and wriggled the ball past Kenny to make it 2-0.

There were boos at half time but Leeds made a determined 2nd half start, Smith seeing a gap header tipped over by Bond but on 50 Danny Pugh's reward for a determined effort into the box resulted in a superbly taken strike from a acute angle from the left to half the deficit and awake the Elland road crowd from its slumber.

Six minutes later, Leeds were level and it was goal machine McCormack who crossed for Matt Smith to head home his sixth of the season. Leeds were level but it seemingly appeared the omens were against them when Bond made a terrific save from Austin and McCormack had the ball in the net only to be ruled offside by the finicky lines men's flag.

However MCCormack grabbed what we and he thought was the winner when he latched on to Murphy's excellently executed pass and slipped our third past Bond on 75 minutes sparking bedlam in the stands! The comeback of all comebacks was complete, so we thought.

We looked comfortable enough until Deeney reacted quickly on 83 to a Paddy Kenny parry and squared a six goal thriller.

At half time we would have probably accepted a draw, but the tempo in which we came out in the second half and finally took the game to Watford makes it feel almost like a defeat. We are still in touch with the play off contenders but there will be a feeling that we should have nailed this win which slipped from our grasp.

Photo: Action Images

TimWhelan added 10:21 - Dec 8 At half-time most people were saying that their lead was against the run of play, but we found it hard to cope with their quick passing moves. I thought Kenny was slow to get down for the first, while for the second Byram was scared to make the tackle while he was last man, in case h brought the player down. I don't know what McDermott said at half time, but Watford couldn't cope with our physical style of play in the second half. It's a shame we didn't hold on for the win, as the extra two points would have put us fifth instead of eighth.

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