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Leeds United: Whites strike a positive note
The problem of Leeds United's frail defence is refusing to disappear overnight. Their misfiring attack, on the other hand, was always likely to banish its ills in the blink of an eye.
Last weekend, Leeds were being categorised as a team who knew the way to goal but were making hard work of crossing the line.
Nine days, nine goals and two victories later, the matter of whether their forwards had lost their touch has been conclusively settled.
United's defeat to Huddersfield Town last Saturday highlighted the two factors which have most influenced the club's results since their run of six straight victories was ended by Peterborough United at the start of October.
At one end of the field, a flimsy defence was causing Gary McAllister to scratch his head with almost as much intensity as a frontline which lacked a consistently lethal attitude in front of goal.
In the space of a week, one half of that equation has solved itself and United's rousing defeat of Hartlepool at Elland Road was a lesson in the art of being clinical.
Danny Wilson, Hartlepool's manager, contended that Saturday's 4-1 scoreline was more favourable to Leeds than it should have been, and his opinion was fair. But the debatable merit of the scale of United's victory was a minor argument, lessened in importance by the certainty that Leeds deserved their win.
Having opened the scoring after 15 minutes, Leeds invited Hartlepool back into the match with a goal which mirrored so many scored against McAllister's team this season – soft, charitable and easily avoidable – but the test to United's character was ultimately passed.
Fabian Delph completed an individually memorable week in which he made his England Under-21 debut and reached his 19th birthday with a delicious goal in the 50th minute, and the 2-1 lead it afforded United placed control of the game back in their hands.
Luciano Becchio and Jermaine Beckford scored again before the final whistle, compiling a scoreline that failed to reflect the extent to which United had been wobbled by Hartlepool before their crucial third goal but which also prevented the type of late, ill-deserved blow which Huddersfield struck at Elland Road on November 15.
Wilson adopted a sensible and familiar counter-attacking strategy, a system which is often effective against Leeds' preference for dominance, and the contrast of styles led to an excellent fixture, packed with incident and the essence of a serious contest.
Hereford United, who lost 1-0 at Leeds in September, were more convincingly beaten than Hartlepool.
A shot from visiting striker Kevin Kyle which hit the crossbar while Leeds led 2-1 was a critical moment, and Wilson was no more impressed by the goals his side conceded than McAllister was by Joel Porter's 25th-minute strike.
The second-half goals from Beckford and Becchio were created by long balls towards Hartlepool's box, both of which found Wilson's defenders timid and vulnerable.
United's victory relied on restraint and patience, two of the most visible and valuable qualities that McAllister has fostered among his squad. The Scot felt comfortable at half-time with the teams level at 1-1 but, despite his confidence, there was a strong possibility that Leeds were about to drop two valuable points.
Hartlepool had been enthused by Porter's reply to Beckford's opening goal and they boasted enough pace to trouble Leeds on the break. One counter-attack immediately before the interval should have come to far more than the tame effort from Ritchie Jones which sailed meekly over David Lucas' goal.
United must have sensed Hartlepool's optimism but their tactics held as steady as their nerve. At no point while the visitors held parity did Leeds bow to the pressure they were under by taking a more direct approach and McAllister has been highly successful in convincing his squad to trust in the quality of their passing game.
It is, without question, the style in which Leeds so often excel.
The fact that the strength of their position was uncertain at half-time was due purely to the goal which Porter poached.
Beckford, who looked full of life after his hat-trick in last Monday's 5-2 victory over Northampton Town, gave United the lead with his second opportunity of the game, rising on 15 minutes to glance an unstoppable header past Arran Lee-Barrett, and the effort was the product of Leeds' ambitious start.
Lee-Barrett had denied Beckford eight minutes earlier after the striker charged through the centre of Hartlepool's defence and drove a low shot at goal and the visitors took a back seat during the opening 20 minutes.
A short flurry of pressure from Wilson's players, however, was all they needed to force an equaliser.
Lubomir Michalik prevented what seemed to be a certain goal when he dispossessed Porter with a brilliant tackle six yards from his own line, but a lack of organisation among McAllister's defenders handed Hartlepool's striker his goal 60 seconds later.
A corner from Jones deflected skywards inside United's box and when Michael Nelson nudged the ball through a crowd of players towards Lucas, Porter ran in to clip home his 11th goal of the season.
The fightback from Leeds was instantaneous and Becchio was denied by two quick saves from Lee-Barrett after a kind deflection played him in behind Hartlepool's defence.
Both the striker and Michalik were also unlucky not to convert Delph's 40th-minute corner, the latter's toe-poke scrambled off the line.
The game was delicately balanced at the break but Delph, who until his strike had been unusually quiet and produced little more than a shot against Lee-Barrett's legs, took the contest by the scruff of the neck with a sweet finish five minutes into the second half.
Becchio played a pass to Delph on the edge of Hartlepool's box, and the midfielder slipped away from his markers with a glorious side-step and placed a calm shot to the left of Lee-Barrett.
His goal challenged the visitors to respond for a second time, and they accepted the gauntlet readily.
Kyle's sliding finish crashed against the bar on 57 minutes after Matty Robson broke away down the right wing, and Andy Monkhouse's shot on the rebound failed to find a gap through the crowd of players in front of Lucas' goal.
A deflection also prevented James Brown from scoring from a position where the net seemed to be gaping.
Within two minutes of Brown's effort, Becchio was breaking through to collect Lucas' long clearance and drive a shot into the net and Hartlepool's attacks were reduced to token efforts.
Their defence had one more goal to give, though, and Beckford claimed it in the final minute when he acquired Andrew Hughes' sweeping pass on the edge of the area and rounded Lee-Barrett.
On an afternoon when Leicester City and Scunthorpe United were examining each other at Glanford Park, anything less than a victory over Hartlepool would have met with McAllister's extreme disapproval.
That Beckford's finish swelled the scoreline to such a level was something of a bonus for a manager who one short week ago was asking himself why the goals had dried up.
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Weather for Leeds
Sunday 12 February 2012
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