Leeds United 1-0 Everton: Woo! — Square Ball 20/8/25

God I've missed this

Written by: Rob Conlon

It could have been a dangerous long pass behind Leeds’ defence, but Joe Rodon read the flight of the ball perfectly, accelerated ahead of Everton striker Beto to get there first, nodded it back to his goalkeeper Lucas Perri, and set off sprinting back into position shouting for the ball again. Unlike last season, Rodon didn’t have to wait before the ball was rolling into his path and he could set off again as Leeds drove forward. Shortly afterwards, it went out for a throw-in in Leeds’ half. Rodon didn’t have the patience to wait for Jayden Bogle to get back, once again sprinting over to take the throw-in to Perri so Leeds could keep moving. United weren’t in the mood for hanging around. There was a game to be won and everyone inside Elland Road could smell blood.

God I’ve missed this! Elland Road under the lights is a powerful beast. It wasn’t always pretty, but Leeds’ eagerness to snap into tackles and keep Everton penned into their own half lit the touchpaper of an already fevered atmosphere. Gabi Gudmundsson chased into a fifty-fifty and booted the ball out for a goal-kick, if only to prove he got there first. The crowd roared. Dan James blocked a clearance with his face. The crowd roared. Ethan Ampadu chased Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall to the edge of Everton’s penalty area just to clatter him and you better fucking bet that the crowd roared. What the hell have we been doing with our lives for the last three months without this?

Leeds played all night like they had paid attention to Paul Reaney’s words at last season’s Player of the Year awards. “Everything is possible. Do not be frightened of anybody. Seriously, because there’s a load of rubbish out there.” Everton lived up to the second part, and Leeds tore into them with the swagger of a side determined to prove that they can put the frights up this sanitised division.

Joel Piroe had three sights of goal that on another night he’d have converted at least one. Jordan Pickford’s fingertips prevented Pascal Struijk nodding in a corner. Jake O’Brien blocked a Struijk flick on almost on the line with Ao Tanaka waiting at the back post for a tap in. Everton’s penalty area regularly resembled a pinball machine as they frantically tried to clear the ball amid the sheer weight of attacking pressure from Leeds. After forty minutes United had completed 109 passes in Everton’s half. Everton had only completed sixteen in Leeds’, who didn’t let them get close enough to Perri’s goal to have a single shot in the first half.

The only question was whether Leeds could keep it up. Five minutes before half-time, Tanaka was beckoning teammates forward to join him pressing Everton’s defence alongside Piroe. True enough, the visitors had more of a foothold in the game after the break, ‘enjoying’ more possession than Leeds — not that they seemed to be having much fun. Even the away end briefly woke up, breaking into a song rounded off by a high-pitched ‘woo!’ that sounded less Paul McCartney and more Ric Flair, much to the amusement of the rest of the crowd who were quickly parroting it back at them.

But most encouragingly of all, Leeds held their nerve and kept fighting in the same way they have for the previous two years and 190 points — make that 193 points — under Daniel Farke. While Gudmundsson and Anton Stach brought plenty to the starting XI and have the makings of excellent recruits, the rest of the outfielders who began the match lifted the Championship title with Leeds last season and didn’t look out of place making the next step up. Struijk and Rodon were excellent in defence and made sure Jaka Bijol should have to wait until the League Cup tie at Sheffield Wednesday for his first start. Ampadu set the tone for physicality and aggression in the middle of the pitch. Tanaka was equally tenacious and typically assured. And while Farke reiterated the need for attacking reinforcements afterwards, Piroe’s link-up play was inventive and Wilf Gnonto and Dan James never let Everton’s makeshift full-backs rest.

It was left to the subs to pick up the momentum as it threatened to waver. Jack Harrison and Brenden Aaronson are hardly flavour of the month at Elland Road but maintained Leeds’ hard running as Everton turned to Jack Grealish. Only one team covered more ground in the Premier League than Leeds on the opening weekend of the season.

Ultimately, no opening day win is complete without a debut goal. Step forward, Lukas Nmecha, on in place of Piroe and straight onto penalty duty as James Tarkowski threw an arm (yes, he did) towards a Stach shot that was going straight at Jordan Pickford anyway. Farke doesn’t like subs taking penalties when they’ve only been on the pitch a few minutes and, with Pascal Struijk lurking in the background, said afterwards that he was tempted to intervene and ask for somebody else to take the spot-kick. There was no need. After waiting for VAR to confirm the penalty, Nmecha stayed cool, stuck it in the bottom corner and gave Leeds’ season the lift off it deserved.

Towards the end of pre-season I started to get bored of friendlies, realising I missed The Fear of Leeds fighting for three points every week. It only took one night under the lights to give me a strong enough dose to leave me wanting more. But as the taxi home pulled up outside my house and was passed by a lad in a Leeds trackie top skipping up the road with his arms aloft like Rocky Balboa reaching the top of the steps at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, I was left with the sweet satisfaction of wondering if there’s anything we should really be scared of.