Millwall 1-0 Leeds United: Eat. Sleep. Repeat — Square Ball 7/11/24

An old pair of slippers

Written by: Rob Conlon

Last season, Daniel Farke joined Neil Warnock as the only Leeds United managers to win at The Den in the last fifteen years. It’s not like we’ve been deprived of trips to Bermondsey, either. United have visited Millwall twelve times since 2009, avoiding defeat in just three of those games. But I’m not sure Colin is the kind of company Farke wants to be keeping.

Leeds’ latest defeat at The Den fit like an old pair of slippers, reminiscent of so many of those previous losses. Outmuscled in physical battles, beaten by a set-piece, the omnipresence of Neil Harris. But it wasn’t entirely the same.

For once, Leeds were able to impose their football on the hosts. Whereas it has become a trademark of Millwall (A) for Leeds to have more of the ball but fewer chances than the opposition, on Wednesday night United matched 75% possession with fourteen shots — the same number as last season’s 3-0 victory, and even one more shot on target — while restricting Millwall to six shots, half the amount they took in the same game last September. In many ways, Leeds’ defence and midfield did their job in laying a platform for the attack to decide the game. But that’s where the problems started, and where the heat turns on Farke.

Lacking invention and imagination, Leeds resorted to cross after cross — 29 in total — into the land of Millwall’s giants, namely Jake Cooper. Joel Piroe was standing in the middle of it all, at times seemingly unaware there was a game of football being played around him. Waiting for a chance to fall at his feet rather than sniffing one out himself, when Piroe finally got his opportunity and stuck the ball in the net he was offside.

Behind Piroe, Dan James and Wilf Gnonto had the beating of their full-backs, only for James to fall into the trap of chipping every cross towards Cooper’s head, while Gnonto kept finding different ways to ruin promising opportunities. Out of form since returning from the last international break, Gnonto has been getting more frustrating with each game. In the first half he failed to punish Millwall giving Leeds the ball from their own goal-kick, then headed Leeds’ best chance off target unmarked at the near post straight after the break. The chance was created by a good cross from Brenden Aaronson, who was earlier guilty of gifting a decent sight at goal straight back to Millwall’s ‘keeper, as ever allergic to aiming for the space at the far post.

Running out of ideas, Leeds needed inspiration from the bench, exposing Farke’s biggest weakness as a manager. His ingrained refusal to make changes before the seventy-minute mark is a peculiar streak of stubbornness, although perhaps understandable given his substitutions so regularly make Leeds worse. With United chasing an equaliser, the game ended with the best finisher on the pitch, Piroe, playing as a holding midfielder, while Mateo Joseph and Pat Bamford toiled up front. Joseph did come close to scoring — for Millwall, heading a cross against the post of his own goal. The night was summed up by Leeds aiming two stoppage-time corners towards Illan Meslier, hoping their goalkeeper-turned-striker might possess the finishing touch that had deserted everyone else.

Given Leeds’ toothlessness in attack, it felt cruel that the game was decided by their one lapse in defence, Cooper’s inevitable knockdown met by Japhet Tanganga’s volley while Pascal Struijk and Junior Firpo took too long working out who should have been marking him.

And so the post-match inquest began, as usual directed towards Farke. It’s understandable, and in many ways fair. While the game may not have entirely followed the blueprint of previous defeats to Millwall, it stuck to the script of Leeds’ failings under Farke — a production you’d never want to rewatch. My only frustration with such criticism is that if the players are given most of the credit when Leeds win, they should also shoulder some of the blame when Leeds lose. To steal a phrase from Farke, too many were “slow in the head” and got what they deserved. It happens. Players have bad games. It’s not always the manager’s fault. But sometimes it is, and Farke could make his life much easier if he just made a fucking sub a bit earlier so we have to find something new and more interesting to moan about.

Still, zoom out and there’s plenty of evidence suggesting that Leeds just need to brush this defeat off and stick to their guns. United have a point more and one defeat fewer than at this stage of the last promotion season, with a healthier goal difference to show for it. There will be more days like this, more defeats to come — Leeds lost nine games when winning the title in 2019/20, Leicester eleven last season. Plus, Millwall aren’t only Leeds’ kryptonite in recent history, but the whole division’s, having won more points than any other club since Harris was reappointed as manager, winning their last four games 1-0, including against our promotion rivals Burnley. It pains me to say it, but they might actually be half-decent.

But as long as Leeds are outside the top two and falling short of their two-points-per-game target, the nagging doubts will remain, even if Farke was in bullish mood afterwards:

“This is what I like. It’s game day fourteen in the Championship, more or less just another day in the office, but I still see a tear in the eye of some of my players, especially the younger guys. I like to see how emotional they were. I want them to feel the pain because next time it will lead to a situation, a ball to the second post, and these players will drop to be there I can guarantee.”

The problem for Farke is that there are no guarantees in football. Except, perhaps, Leeds losing at Millwall. It’s one of the reasons why we need to get out of this hellscape of a division as soon as possible: so we never have to go back there again.