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Leeds take the points as Ipswich self-destruct
Leeds take the points as Ipswich self-destruct
Sunday, 22nd Jan 2012 18:20 by Tim Whelan

For the third match in a row Leeds came from behind to get a result against ten men. I can’t ever remember a game when Leeds have played so badly and still won, but somehow Ipswich Town managed to be even worse than us, and the Leeds man of the match was Ipswich defender Ibrahima Sonko

We did of course begin the day with a demonstration against Ken Bates after the departure of our beloved captain earlier in the week. The press were waiting by the Bill Bremner statue for it all to begin, before we moved on to shout at the corporate diners in the new East Stand executive boxes and then went round to the West Stand. But I’m told Ken Bates missed it all, as he preferred to go to the African Cup of Nations in South Africa rather than watch his own club.

At least Pappa Smurf would have found South Africa a little bit warmer than Leeds was yesterday, as a cold wind swirled around Elland Road and contributed to the poor football on display. Simon Grayson dropped Aidy White to the bench to be able to accommodate the returning Fabian Delph in a four man midfield, while Luciano Becchio was dropped as a result of his recent poor form and replaced by Mikael Forsell.

I had feared that this could be a dreadful game between two out of form struggling sides, and I wasn’t wrong. The Leeds team seemed dispirited by the events of the past week and Clayton in particular seemed to be a shadow of his former self, while Delph struggled to get into the game despite one or two nice touches and of the midfield quarter only Snodgrass seemed capable of taking Leeds forward.

As a result the two strikers were starved of service, and only twice before the interval did Leeds create anything resembling a chance. One came when McCormack and Townsend combined well outside the box, only to be denied by out by a timely interception, the other when Townsend failed to connect with a ball that dropped over his head in the box. The anti-Bates chants continued throughout the game, but there was little positive support to try and encourage the team.

As the half wore on Ipswich began to enjoy more possession, and Lonegran had to come quickly off his line to deny Martin, before the rebound was hammered well over the bar. But our keeper didn’t do quite so well when Ipswich scored the first goal of the game in the 35th minute. A corner was played to Andy Drury, who was allowed to run to the edge of the box and shoot, but Lonegran should have had no trouble keeping it out. Instead he managed to gift Ipswich the lead by allowing it to slip beneath his body and into the net.

This dampened the mood still further, and some lads in the East Stand put up an anti-Bates banner, initially refusing to comply with the stewards’ requests to take it down again. And on the field Ipwsich could have gone further in front when Emanuel-Thomas cut inside and tried a left foot shot from thirty yards that clipped the angle of the post and crossbar, while Lonegran stood and watched it.

In the second half the game continued in a similar vein, with Leeds still offering little of an attacking threat while Ipswich decided to fall back into defence to protect their lead. On the hour mark Grayson replaced the ineffectual Townsend and Forssell with White and Becchio, but still Leeds seemed unlikely to get back into the game.

But just when Ipswich should have been able to hold on quite comfortably for the victory, they pressed the self-destruct button in the last 20 minutes, throwing the game away with some catastrophically poor defending. Suddenly they seemed vulnerable to the long hopeful ball banged down the middle, and the dismissal of our former loan keeper Alex McCarthy was the first of several incidents involving the hapless Ibrahima Sonko.

As a hopeful ball was launched over the Town defence Sonko was first to reach it and should have just nodded it down for Mc.Carthy to clear. But his header was too firm and wide of the keeper, so Mc.Carthy had to dive and save it, the only trouble being that he was well out of his box. So a red card was inevitable and our former loan man went down the tunnel to chants of “he’s Leeds and he knows he is”, in appreciation of his comments earlier in the week about how much he enjoyed his stay with us.

Jason Scotland was the player sacrificed so that the reserve Ipswich keeper could come on, and although Snodgrass sent the free kick over the bar, we were now in control of the game against ten men. The equaliser came when McCormack blasted the ball against a defender and it fell to that man Sonko, whose idea of making a backpass was to play a perfect through ball for Snoddy. The Scotsman accepted the gift and simply rolled the ball past Lee- Barratt.

And our second arrived in the 81st minute when Clayton’s long ball forward fell between Sonko and Lee-Barratt. Both left it to the other to clear the danger, with Sonko maybe reluctant to try another backpass after his previous effort had been so catastrophic. With neither man doing anything McCormack was left to get to the ball first and simply knocked it past Lee-Barratt to put Leeds in front.

At last Paul Jewell was forced into a more positive formation and Chopra and Bullard came on, but despite the introduction of these famous names they didn’t look like scoring. Instead Leeds took advantage of the extra space to increase the lead, with the third goal making the game safe as we moved into the 90th minute,

Lonegran banged the ball downfield and Tommy Smith perhaps misjudging the flight of it as he allowed the ball to bounce. This gave Becchio the chance to nip in front and muscle him off the ball, before shooting past Barratt from a narrow angle. There were still five minutes of injury time to be played, but we kept them at bay without any difficulty to take the three points.

So Ipswich sink to 21st in the table and you have to wonder why Paul Jewell is still a job after all the resources he’s had at his disposal this season. And is Grayson’s position any more secure? Our recent results might suggest that we’re running back into form, as we have moved back to within a point of the play-offs with two wins and a draw in the last three, but in all of these games the opposition has gone down to ten men and we can’t keep on getting that sort of luck.

The lacklustre performances we’ve had to put up with in the last six weeks suggest that all is not well behind the scenes and I really do fear for the rest of the season. If we continue to play as we did for the first 70 minutes of yesterday’s game it will be further confirmation that the club will not move forward again until Ken Bates has gone.

Photo: Action Images



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