A Good Day: Leeds vs Everton, 17th March 1996 — Square Ball 3/2/21

QUE SERA SERA

Written by: Moxcowhite • Daniel Chapman

Behind him, in the Family Stand, excited young fans chanted the name of their hero. “Tinkler! Tinkler! Tinkler!”

This was the start of a big week for Leeds United Football Club, and the kids were playing their part. An inconsistent league season had been disrupted by injuries, suspensions, absences for the African Cup of Nations, new signings, new coaches, player sales and, lately, fixture congestion in the cups.

Lining up for a league match with Everton at Elland Road on Sunday, Leeds were 12th in the Premier League. But in midweek they were going to Anfield to replay the FA Cup quarter-final, where victory would put them one big game away from Wembley. A match there was already booked; after Liverpool on Wednesday, Leeds were facing Aston Villa on Sunday in the League Cup final.

With two huge cup games just days ahead, Howard Wilkinson wasn’t taking risks against Everton. 21-year-old Mark Tinkler was on corners because Gary McAllister was being rested. Around him in midfield were two twenty-year-olds, Mark Ford and Andy Couzens, with eighteen-year-old Andy Gray wide on the left.

Gary Speed was going from doctor to doctor, trying to find one who would pass his fractured cheekbone fit for Wembley; the first opinion was that he shouldn’t play again that season, but he didn’t want to miss out. Carlton Palmer was in defence, where David Wetherall and Nigel Worthington were suspended and Tony Dorigo was injured, another trying to get fit for the cup. Gary Kelly switched to left-back to help Gray against Andrei Kanchelskis, John Pemberton played right-back against Anders Limpar, and Lucas Radebe was in the middle to help Palmer cope with Graham Stuart and Duncan Ferguson.

Up front, Tony Yeboah’s fitness was such that if today was the cup final, he’d play, but it wasn’t, so he didn’t. Brian Deane led the line with Tomas Brolin, the pair not so much filling in as fighting for selection at Wembley. And maybe not so much Brolin; he might have been playing to get out of the final and out of Yorkshire, the morning’s papers claiming he was already to be sold off just weeks after his £4.5m transfer from Parma.

Youth team manager Paul Hart was on the bench next to Wilkinson, perhaps ready to run on with a hug if it all got too much for the youngsters. Even Gary Kelly, a World Cup veteran, was only 21. The introduction of youth and the anticipation of Wembley gave the match an almost giddy start. The Kop were singing ‘Que sera sera’ while John Lukic dummied and dribbled around Graham Stuart; Kanchelskis, ex of Old Trafford, was booed; Ferguson being denied an obvious corner was cheered; and in six minutes Deane started the scoring.

Radebe took the ball from Kelly’s throw on the left and aimed a firm square pass at Brolin in the penalty area; his one-touch lay-off was read by Deane, whose shot was deflected inside Neville Southall’s near post. Deane had his shirt over his face, the young Leeds players had a lead to defend, Brolin had an assist that was almost like the old days.

The easy life ended there. One reason the singing in the Family Stand sounded so loud, and the shouts of encouragement from United’s bench — “Come on Andy! Come on, son!” — was the depression that gripped the crowd of just 29,422 for the rest of the half. There was desire to cheer on the kids from the youth team. But it couldn’t overcome the feeling that they might not be good enough.

Couzens, Ford and Tinkler were young, but it felt like they had been around for a long time. It was nearly three years since Ford had lifted the FA Youth Cup, and a number of players from that night — David Beckham, Gary Neville, Paul Scholes — were playing regularly in a team that was about to take the Premier League to Old Trafford. At Elland Road, the class of ’93 were chasing shadows in Everton’s midfield, Kanchelskis sprinting with the ball from one wing to link up with Anders Limpar on the other, whose cross was headed in by Stuart.

It had been twenty difficult minutes between the lead and the equaliser, and only one more minute before Stuart should have made it two, shooting wide after Kelly’s header didn’t reach Lukic. A minute after that Couzens brought Ferguson down but Andy Hinchcliffe hit the penalty wide, and then it was over to Lukic: he was the only Leeds player getting a touch, his saves keeping them in it.

But at the other end was Deane, with a deft touch putting Leeds back in front moments before half-time. Another throw from Kelly on the left found Tinkler’s intelligent run; bursting into the penalty area, he beat two defenders on his way to the byline, then cut back to the near post. Deane was there to sidefoot past Southall, and after congratulating Tinkler, he celebrated his smart finish with his shirt over his face again.

Everton equalised again five minutes after the restart, when Radebe gave away a corner and, at the back post, Kanchelskis had a volley deflected into the net. But Leeds were a more determined team in the second half. Couzens moved wider to stop Limpar and Hinchcliffe, while Ford and Tinkler got the upper hand in midfield; Ford got a late kick from a frustrated Barry Horne for his trouble. Gray had skill and composure whenever he got the ball on the left, and Brolin was desperate to bring him into the game, sending him backheel after backheel as if it was the magic spell to turn him into Gianfranco Zola.

Brolin was willing — several times he chased blue shirts backwards, trying to make it look as if he knew how to tackle. But more often he looked lost, squeezed behind Horne and beneath Craig Short or David Unsworth, not understanding why Lukic kept aiming high goal kicks at him when Deane was right there, not persuading the referee that being bashed to the ground every time was worth a free-kick. He tried two shots, but they were both first timers from more than thirty yards out; the first rolled out for a throw-in, the second hardly made it into Southall’s gloves. Brolin’s work rate was one problem. That he no longer seemed able to kick a ball very hard was another.

Brolin was replaced by Phil Masinga with three minutes left, a few minutes after Rod Wallace took over from the limping Couzens, but otherwise Wilkinson was content to let his young midfield keep grinding. They were helped immensely by Brian Deane. When Sky named him man of the match, commentator Andy Gray mentioned the two goals, of course, but enthused over his running. Every outball, into the deepest channel, had been chased down by Deane, who knew he couldn’t expect any of McAllister’s precision coming out of this midfield, and that the kids in there needed a target man who would make anything into something.

“Brian’s display has certainly reinforced his Wembley hopes,” said Wilkinson, but he was more enamoured with his goalkeeper, and the young players scrapping their way to a point.

“It was a very searching examination for them,” he said. “John Lukic was brilliant for them, and in the middle of the game they were getting a pummelling, but they hung in there and showed there’s nothing wrong with their character.”

Maybe Paul Hart’s boys could catch up with their Old Trafford peers after all. Andy Gray’s emergence in their wake was adding to the optimism, and his family connection to the Revie era added to the romance. There was more to come; that week, Hart was talking to Mick McCarthy about involving Ian Harte, Alan Maybury and Stephen McPhail in Ireland’s Under-21s.

That was the long term. Short term, Leeds had two massive cup games to play, with McAllister, Yeboah, Speed, Dorigo, Wetherall and Wallace demanding their places in the team.

“It’s been a good day for the club,” said Wilkinson. “And a good start to the week.”