After an early scare, Leeds went on to secure a comfortable victory over the MK Dons.
There were a couple of changes to the starting line-up, with Beckford coming in for Dickinson on his return from suspension, and new loan signing Sam Sodje replacing the injured Rui Marques. Robinson had recovered from his own hamstring problem, but could only make the bench at the expense of Mike Grella.
This left Grella free for the pre-match presentations, and as I watched him on LUTV from the bar below the stand I thought he looked a bit pissed off, while he had to pose for photos with the Lincoln and Chiltern members branches.
When the action began, the MK Dons made a lively start, and they were close to taking the lead with a free kick in the 11th minute. The ball seemed to take a deflection and Casper was slow to react, but then he did well to get a hand to the ball, which obligingly went past the post before curling to go out of play. It could easily have rolled into the net or back out to one of the MK forwards who were racing into the area to get to the rebound.
After that Leeds started to get into the game, though there were some odd collisions in the middle of the field, as the MK defenders tried to block Beckford’s runs off the ball. Maybe Di Matteo has adopted an old Italian tactic, as I remember Inter defending in the same way in a televised European game a few years ago. Beckford was getting more and more wound up by this, but luckily this was one occasion when he just managed to keep his temper in check.
Of course, Beckford’s mood was helped by scoring the opening goal in the 37th. minute. This came from a free kick which Snodgrass lifted into the area and Becchio headed across the face of goal, and this time Beckford managed to elude the MK defence with his constant movement, before volleying past Gueret.
And the second arrived nine minutes into the second half, coming on the break after Douglas broke up an MK move well into our half. Kilkenny played a long ball down field to Beckford, who headed back to Snodgrass, then made a run into the box that the defence failed to track. Snod obliged with an excellent return pass, and Becks was free to slot the ball past Gueret and just inside the near post.
The Dons defenders were left to argue amongst themselves, and shortly afterwards there was a bit of trouble in their section, which ended with two fans being led out after seemingly fighting with stewards and the police. Leeds carried on with the job in hand, and Beckford should have completed a hat-trick on the hour when another long ball (this time from Naylor) put him clean through against the keeper, but this time he went for power instead of picking his spot, and the ball curled just wide of the far post.
Shortly afterwards we had to make our first change, as Sodje had gone down injured for the third time, obviously still being troubled by his dodgy knee. He produced a most impressive debut, tackling well and always strong in the air, but given his fitness problems you have to wonder if he’s going to be able to hold out till the end of the season. Lubo came on, and for once managed to get through the rest of the game without being seriously exposed.
I started to wonder if we would regret Beckford’s failure to get the third goal, but although Jermal Johnson put in a lively performance once he’d come on, they never really managed to threaten our goal. Their best effort was a run down their right from Baldock, who went past several defenders and put a dangerous ball across the face of goal, but nobody managed to get on the end of it. After that Hughes came on for Kilkenny, maybe to tighten things up a bit and protect our lead.
In the closing stages it was Leeds who came closest to scoring, with an excellent run from Delph, when he went past three defenders in the box, perhaps trying to emulate Eddie Gray’s famous goal at that end in 1970. But it went on a little too long, and by the time he got a shot in, Gueret was almost on top of him, and was able to knock the ball out for a corner.
We survived four minutes of injury time to claim the victory that took us to within a point of the Dons, and the position looked even better when the stadium announcer told us that Milwall had only drawn at Crewe. But unfortunately I discovered when I got home that the South London mob had actually grabbed a winner in the 92nd. minute.
With most of the other top sides also winning, it’s looking increasingly likely that our good run has come too late to get us into an automatic promotion slot. With Peterborough and Millwall in such good form themselves I can’t see them dropping enough points to give us a chance of catching them, but at least we seem to be in good shape for the play-offs.