It certainly wasn’t a game that will live long in the memory, but the result was the main thing, and Leeds withstood a spirited second-half comeback from Stoke City to seal yet another home win in this exhausting promotion campaign.

Our manager was quoted by the Athletic as saying “Everyone expects us to win this home game. I’m happy with the first half, we needed 15 or 20 minutes to get going and then we were all over them. Second half we opted too much to wait for the transition moment. When we had the ball we did not control the game because we were too greedy to go for the next attack, a basketball game. “

“It was not our best second half, but these hard-fought wins are what bring you into a top position.” And he also told BBC Radio Leeds: "We didn't have a dip in form at Huddersfield, but we had a dip in result with the draw after winning nine, and then the next game is only two and a half days later, also against a side fighting with everything they have got against relegation. In this type of game, to dig in and grind out a result is important to us."

This was the second instalment of our run of four games against teams battling against relegation, and Farke made a couple of changes in anticipation of the tough battle to come. Conor Roberts got his first league start as Archie had a break, while Firpo had a slight injury, so Byram began the game. And James was back on the right wing in place of Gnonto.

As the manager said, Leeds took a while to get going, and the first incident of note came after about 20 minutes, when the Stoke keeper made a mess of controlling a backpass, giving James the sniff of a chance of coming in to dispossess him. And although Iversen played the ball at some point, it looks from the TV replays as though he tripped James first, but there was no penalty.

To be fair to the ref, it would have been very hard to judge from some distance away, but the crowd were incensed, and that was the signal for Leeds to start to ramp up the pressure. Our first chance was a fierce left-footed drive by Bamford from a narrow angle, but Iversen started to make amends for almost messing up, and made the first of a number of fine saves.

Next, a long ball from Rutter set James free to run into the area, but he also had to shoot left-footed from a narrow angle and Iversen blocked the shot with his legs. Next, Kamara curled a ball into the path of James from the other side of the area, but when the Welshman cut inside to shoot left-footed the Stoke keeper made a fine diving stop.

But if you keep creating chances the chances are that sooner or later a bit of luck will go your way. In the 33rd minute James raced down the right wing and turned one way and then the other as he came into the area. And just as I thought he’d done too much and needed to pass to a colleague, his shot took a couple of deflections and Iversen was finally beaten.

Stoke’s best chance of the half came from our former loanee Lewis Baker, from a distance of at least 30 yards. As he brought the ball forward he looked one way and then the other, but decided that as there wasn’t really a good pass available he needed to try a shot. Meslier had to tip it over the bar, and we can be thankful that the shot was pretty much straight at him.

Baker was then informed that he was “too **** to play for Leeds”, despite the evidence he’d just provided to the contrary. But with Leeds having had by far the better of the first half, we all thought that our dominance would continue, and we could go on to record another comfortable victory.

But that’s not exactly how the second half panned out. Either we’re beginning to run out of puff after the hectic schedule of the last few weeks, or Stoke manager Steven Schumacher delivered the mother of all team talks during the interval. Nine minutes into the second period he was the first to make a couple of changes, with Campbell and Pearson coming on, and they would make very different impacts on the course of the game.

After Baker had forced another save from Meslier, Pearson got involved in an unnecessary tussle with Rodon after a foul on James and was shown his first yellow card. While Campbell’s contribution was more constructive, taking the ball past Ampadu, and producing a shot that Meslier needed to save with his legs.

Farke’s response was to make changes to his forward line, with Bamford and Rutter making way for Piroe and Joseph. I thought that was a little harsh on the players removed, as we were more in need of getting a grip in midfield, and the forwards hadn’t had much chance to contribute when we couldn’t get the ball to that end of the pitch.

That said, one of the subs was close to sealing the win, as a long ball came down the middle and Joseph had the strength to hold off two defenders and take the ball into the area. But when he went round the keeper he took it a little too wide and so couldn’t get much power into his shot. This gave one of the defenders just enough time to race back and stop it crossing the line.

Gnonto came on for Summerville, who hadn’t had one of his better nights, and then we finally had the change I’d wanted earlier, with Gray coming on for Kamara. Firpo also replaced Byram in the hope that a fresh pair of legs in defence would help to keep Stoke at bay. That looked a little easier as James was taken out off the ball while Ampadu raced forward, the culprit being Pearson, who duly collected his second yellow card and then a red.

Another chance to seal the win came when a long ball found James racing through the middle, but although he controlled the ball well as he took it into the area, he sent his shot straight at the advancing Iversen, who took the ball full in the face. And we might have thought that the red card would end Stoke’s resistance, but there were still some anxious moments during the six minutes of injury time.

With time almost up ball was crossed from the left wing and Campbell played it back to the edge of the area, but Meslier got down to save the final shot of the game. Most of the 36,000 crowd breathed a massive sigh of relief, but at that same moment Ipswich were getting their second equaliser in the game that kicked off 15 minutes later.

The Suffolk mob delighted us all by missing a penalty, but Leif Davis grabbed their winner, to reignite the social media debate about whether we should have sold him. With Leicester remembering how to win and Southampton’s game being postponed tonight, it’s been yet another week when none of the top four have dropped any points.

And so we move on to Hillsborough on Friday night for the next instalment of our hectic race for promotion. And if we really have finally discovered the art of grinding out wins against teams at the bottom of the table, that will come in very handy.

Reuters

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