13th April 2026. English Premier League.
Well, where do I start? I don’t think many Leeds fans, even the most optimistic among us, saw that result coming! There were a few tongue-in-cheek pre-match predictions, one, who will remain nameless, told me, “We’ll spank their bums!” … When I bumped into him outside the ground after the game, he reminded me of that too!
Seriously, though, it was a result we may well have all dreamed of, but no one expected it. Manchester United had put an unbelievably profitable home run together – unbeaten in nine Premier League games at Old Trafford, including wins against Manchester City, Fulham, Aston Villa, Crystal Palace and others. They were looking good for a lucrative Champions League spot, and we all know the individual quality they have. I thought we might, if we played at our best and had a bit of luck, bring back a point just as we did from Anfield and Stamford Bridge.
But football is a funny old game, and it never ceases to surprise. It wasn’t really a surprise that Leeds were so good in the first 45 minutes of this game – we’ve shown we can do that many times this season, not least the most recent performance at West Ham in the cup – but it was a surprise that the Salford Reds were so poor! The reason this post is a bit late is that I wanted to have a look at a few Man United fan blogs to see what they made of it. In a nutshell, they were all gobsmacked. They had not seen that sort of performance from their heroes since pre-Michael Carrick days, although they did say that all but four of those Man U starters were the same ones they used to see putting in dire displays like that every week under Erik ten Hag! Manchester United were very poor in that first half. Maybe they underestimated the negative aspect of having a 24-day interlude since their previous game, Leeds had that workout against the Hammers, of course, in that time.
But Leeds were superb, and we took full advantage of that disparity. Noah Okafor showed us just what an instinctive and dangerous player he can be if he can just stay free of injury. Scoring in the fifth minute was just what Leeds needed to settle any nerves, and we should probably have scored a couple of minutes earlier than that if Dominic Calvert-Lewin had slid the ball home instead of sliding it straight at Senne Lammens. I know it’s churlish to point out ‘problems’ after such a landmark victory, but DCL is just not firing for us at the moment and hasn’t done so for several weeks now. You can argue that he was ‘in the right place’ for this early chance and could do little more with it, but I can’t help feeling a top PL striker would have steered that home. There is no excuse for messing up the free header he had in the second half, though. As we dare to think about a second season in the Premier League, there must be a question mark as to whether DCL is consistent enough for the job. Anyway, for me, DCL was a touch slow to react for that early chance, and it was undoubtedly a big chance missed. Let’s not overlook the fantastic ball into him by Gabby Gudmundsson though!
But I digress, Okafor! Let’s give credit to DCL for the challenge he put in on Leny Yoro to force the young defender to sloppily head the ball down to Noah’s feet after a superb cross came in from Jayden Bogle, but boy was Noah sharp and composed to stick that one in the net; instinctive finishing from the Swiss international. You always need a touch of luck, too, and on another day, I know refs who would have pulled that back for the challenge by DCL on Yoro, leading with his arm as he did. It would have been a real ’Patrick Bamford’ moment had that goal been disallowed just because of a poor challenge.
As we did at West Ham, the early goal didn’t change the way we played and, helped by the lacklustre response from the hosts, Leeds continued to pile forward. The Reds had a couple of isolated breaks – one foiled by Jaka Bijol as he got a timely challenge in and another when Amad Diallo got past Gudmundsson to fire wide –, but that was the extent of their efforts. At the other end, Bijol put a header over the bar from a corner and then, one of those ‘limbs’ moments in the away end as Leeds grabbed a second.
It was the sort of defending from Man U that we have all seen from Leeds at times this season; another great cross into the box, this time from James Justin, who’d been left in acres of space on the right. The ball was cut out with a sliding intervention in the six-yard box, but was then sloppily played to a man on the edge of the area, who had Ethan Ampadu racing at him to win the ball back. It broke to Brenden Aaronson, but his shot was crowded out, and then we had a few seconds of head tennis as the Reds just could not get the ball away. Eventually, it arrived in the air to Okafor again, twenty yards out, and he tried his luck with a volley. When your luck’s in and all that. The ball took a touch off the unfortunate Yoro on the way through, wrong-footing Lammens and nestling in the net. It was another little lesson for Leeds, have a shot, lads, you never know what might happen, too often we are looking for the perfect opening before having a swing.
Just before the break, we had two more great opportunities – one where DCL just couldn’t stretch to reach a cross, and then another huge chance when Okafor was alert again to press a defender into an error on the edge of the box. The ball broke to Ao Tanaka, and you’d have bet your house on him having the composure to finish, but he seemed to be in two minds, and then the ball got away from him, and Lisandro Martinez slid in to deflect his close-range poke at goal wide. Pascal Struijk then won a header from the corner that he should probably have put wide of the keeper, not at him. It was no exaggeration to say we ought to have been four goals up at the break; we’d been superb, and they were dire.
As we’ve seen so often in this situation, our second-half performance was nowhere near as effective. No doubt the home side did some thinking and came up with better answers and a bit of a re-shuffle, and they were much better in the second 45, especially and weirdly once they had Martinez sent off for a daft pull of DCL’s flowing locks. For Leeds, maybe we started to feel the pressure on our shoulders to hold on to such a monumental result.
Right from the very start of the second half, Leeds were almost caught cold as Benjamin Sesko was allowed to slalom past international team-mate Bijol too easily to get a shot away. Thankfully, Karl Darlow was alert and got a block in, and Justin headed the looping ball away from the line. It was a warning, though, that things were changing out there. As Daniel Farke said after the game, maybe the red card helped galvanise the hosts, making them realise they needed to dig in, while we have seen many times how teams struggle against ten men for some reason. Matheus Cunha forced Darlow into a save after the striker got the better of three Leeds defenders, and then, of course, they scored on 68 minutes. We didn’t close down Bruno Fernandes, allowing him to cross, and then we weren’t close enough to Casemiro at the back post, allowing him to pick his spot with a header. 1-2 and the nerves began to jangle! Leeds have not been the best defensively all season, and once again, we started to look edgy back there, ball-watching and failing to pick up the spare attacker at the back post. Again, we saw it last week in the Cup, and the scenario felt similar, with the home crowd finally feeding on some hope of a comeback.
There was still that free header from DCL that he should have put away – another huge chance missed – and we then needed a couple of vital saves from Darlow to keep our precious lead intact as our frailty at the back was just about outweighed by the fighting spirit and dogged determination that we have had to resort to so often, and we got to the finish line.
I apologise for pointing out some negatives on such a great night, but I think it is important we don’t get carried away just yet. We have to constantly remember that we are a new team, a useful but limited team at this level, and to be successful at the moment, we have to be almost perfect. “We are not immaculate”, Farke told reporters last night. But that first half performance against a team that can be almost ‘immaculate’ at its best was superb, and everyone played a part.
We have restored that six-point gap to the bottom three, and survival is in our own hands, and I can almost taste the champagne! Now we have to ensure that we get another positive result on Saturday against Wolves to make the most of what we achieved last night. It won’t be easy. If this season has shown us anything, it is that the poor-quality teams, those fighting for survival at the bottom, are often more difficult to play against than the free-flowing teams at the top. Come on, you Mighty Whites, let’s finish the job! Oh, one more thing; remember how we finished last season when the pressure was on? Six straight wins…
Premier League
Manchester United 1 (Casemiro 69’)
Leeds United 2 (Okafor 5’, 29’)
Manchester United: Lammens (GK), Mazraoui (Dalot 69’), Martinez, Fernandes (C), Cunha, Yoro, Diallo (Mbeumo 69’), Casemiro, Shaw, Ugarte, Sesko. Subs not used: Bayindir (GK), Mount, Zirkzee, Malacia, Heaven, Fletcher, Lacey.
Leeds United: Darlow (GK), Bogle, Gudmundsson, Ampadu (C), Struijk, Calvert-Lewin, Aaronson (Longstaff 86’), Bijol, Okafor (Gnonto 74’), Tanaka (Gruev 74’), Justin. Subs not used: Perri (GK), Piroe, Nmecha, Bornauw, Byram, Buonanotte.
Venue: Old Trafford
Referee: Paul Tierney
Attendance: 74,018
Booked: Cunha, Shaw, Fernandes (Manchester United) Justin, Ampadu (Leeds United)
Sent off: Martinez (Manchester United)
