Leeds United 2-0 Hull City: Beeston, we have lift off — Square Ball 2/9/24

Deliberate strategy

Written by: Rob Conlon

On the last day of August and with the transfer window closed until the New Year, Leeds United finally delivered what supporters thought they would be getting in the opening match of the season.

That might sound entitled but, at every level of the club, this summer has been fraught with the tension between expectation and reality. A squad “rebuild”, as Daniel Farke put it, was always going to be a hard sell off the back of a play-off final defeat. With executives promising they had learned the lessons of last summer, supporters understandably had far less patience when the club threatened to repeat the same mistakes, regardless of whether it was a ‘deliberate strategy’ or not. Perhaps if the transfer window closed before the season began Leeds would have been ready for Portsmouth’s visit to Elland Road at the start of the month. Or perhaps we’d never have expected them to have been, if only the suits understood that if they’re going to talk the talk then they need to walk the walk.

Instead, the six-goal circus against Portsmouth felt like a faux-opening day, the sometimes sunny, sometimes stormy weather as indecisive as Leeds’ performance. Crysencio Summerville had just been sold, and Georgi Rutter was soon saying his goodbyes, with Jayden Bogle the only new signing in the starting XI. Shipping three goals at home to Middlesbrough in the cup and the dour stalemate at West Brom only added to the sense of a false start. Come full-time against Hull, Leeds had given Elland Road what it was craving three weeks ago — flashy new signings receiving heroes’ welcomes, our exciting young striker scoring a crucial goal, and the warmth from the terraces reflecting the late-summer sun.

I try my best not to get sucked into the hype surrounding transfers, the mini-industry created by TV companies and Twitter celebrities that amounts to a huge waste of energy. Yet I can’t deny the impact a new signing can have on a crowd, and the rush of seats slapping back rests as supporters stand to see the new lad with the ball at his feet. In this instance it was Manor Solomon, thrown straight into the team four days after joining. With barely a minute on the clock, Solomon was playing Junior Firpo into space in the penalty area to create a chance for Wilf Gnonto that was blocked, and soon began toying with Lewie Coyle with a first touch and shimmy of the hips that radiated class.

Solomon’s introduction on the left wing meant Gnonto switching to the right, reprising his role from the win at Sheffield Wednesday by roaming inside to whichever spaces would let him get on the ball. Gnonto’s early chance came from the inside left channel and soon he was an inside right, putting the overlapping Bogle in on goal, only for Bogle to shoot into the side-netting and get a telling off from Brenden Aaronson and Mateo Joseph, who were waiting for a pass.

Gnonto claimed to have scored the first Leeds goal from a corner since Matt Heath against Burnley in April 2007 but was foiled by an offside flag, which became his nemesis for the afternoon. The disallowed goal lifted Hull’s spirits for the remainder of the first half, Liam Millar testing Illan Meslier’s reflexes on a couple of occasions, even if Meslier himself caused some of Leeds’ biggest problems by twice gifting the ball to Hull attackers hovering near the penalty area.

Still, it was hardly riveting stuff, uneventful enough for me to feel safe watching the end of the first half from the (newly carpeted, aren’t we lucky?) bar of the North East Upper. But this is what Hull do. While they’re waiting for their first win of the season, their Champo record before visiting Elland Road was played three, drawn three. Only five teams in the division lost fewer games than them in 2023/24. As Leeds’ draw and stoppage-time win over Hull proved last season, they’re difficult to beat.

Step forward then, first an overlooked hero in Meslier, alert in rushing to the edge of his box and preventing a Hull one-on-one, even if he awkwardly used his feet rather than his hands. It wasn’t particularly eye-catching, but it was important, just like Joseph racing to reach a Meslier hoof ahead of Coyle, scrapping to hold the ball up and drag Leeds back up the pitch. Five minutes later, Joseph got his reward, poaching the opener from Solomon’s near-post cross with a difficult finish he made look easy.

Daniel Farke said he “loved” Joseph’s goal, and so did I. “He definitely has instinct,” he said afterwards. “It’s unfair to compare with other players.” Farke was talking about a potential comparison with Archie Gray, and whether Joseph can stay in the team this season like Archie did last year. But while it feels cruel, it isn’t unfair to compare Joseph’s finishing to Pat Bamford’s, and wonder whether Leeds now have a striker with the instinct to tip fifty-fifty chances in their favour.

As Farke also said, “We can speak when he has twenty or thirty goals, not now.” And while one goal is not enough to prove Joseph can fire Leeds to promotion — he’s missed much easier chances in previous games than the one he scored against Hull — he’s already proven he has the physicality and awareness to replicate Bamford’s role helping out the defence. Leeds’ second started with Joseph winning the ball back from a set-piece, before freeing Firpo on a counter-attack to find sub Joel Piroe with a first-time cross. For all Piroe has seemingly been playing half-asleep, the sight of only a goalkeeper to beat jolted him awake. He was never going to miss.

The security of a second goal gave Farke the opportunity to kickstart the party we hoped we were going to have against Portsmouth. Largie Ramazani had already been brought off the bench for his debut, showing in a couple of bursts that he should be fun to see more of, and he was soon joined by Ao Tanaka, whose first touch, a simple ten-yard square ball™, was greeted with a round of applause and the first in a series of olés. Shortly afterwards, Sam Byram was getting in on the fun, pirouetting slowly and carefully in possession like a dad dancing under a disco ball while the South Stand were singing Tanaka’s name to the tune of Tequila.

It might have taken three weeks longer than expected, but by hook or by crook Leeds have given supporters the chance to look forward to the rest of the season with optimism. What felt like a bleak August after the draw at West Brom now looks like a solid start to the season: unbeaten in four league games, three consecutive clean sheets, seven goals scored, and a two-points-per-game record that should earn promotion already established. Beeston, we have lift off.