Sunderland 1-1 Leeds United: Looking Up — Square Ball 29/12/25

No Dancing

Written by: Rob Conlon

With a minute left of normal time, Jaka Bijol put his name and forehead on a ball into Leeds’ half of the pitch and cleared it to safety, getting a kick in his midriff from a Sunderland player for his troubles. It was a foul, but Bijol wasn’t getting any sympathy from the referee, who pointed for a Sunderland throw-in. He wasn’t getting any sympathy from his captain, either. From a few yards away, Ethan Ampadu beckoned his teammate to his feet and waved him back into position. “Get up! Get up!” Still grimacing from the kick, Bijol did what he was told — and spent the remaining few minutes making sure Leeds left the Stadium of Light with the point that was the least they deserved.

A 1-1 draw made it five games without defeat for Leeds, hopefully underlining December 2025 as the defining run of form that will mean they are still a Premier League club come August 2026. A month ago we were waiting for Daniel Farke to be sacked, resigned to the inevitable and terrified of what was to come next. Now Leeds are 16th in the table after eighteen games; twenty points on the board, seven clear of the bottom three, six short of 8th. Players both new and old revitalised all over the pitch. Would we have taken that before the season began? I’m loath to speak on your behalf — but yes we bloody would have.

The only shame about the last month is that so much of the analysis has focussed on the change in formation to 3-5-2, as if this is all down to Farke moving a few pieces around on a chess board. Tactical clarity (copyright: Jesse Marsch) has no doubt helped Leeds in the last five games, but it has been secondary to a grit in the stomach and no shortage of skill in the boots. The comebacks against Man City and Liverpool. Ao Tanaka hitting the bottom corner against Chelsea. Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s refound composure in front of goal. A formation can only do so much, but with a little help from the bloke in the dugout — including a half-time bollocking at the Stadium of Light — the players on the pitch are continuing to show different sides to themselves with each passing match.

There was no greater exhibit at Sunderland than Leeds’ equaliser in the second half. Having had so much success in the preceding games playing direct into Calvert-Lewin and capitalising on set-pieces, Farke reacted to Joe Rodon’s injury and Simon Adingra’s annoyingly classy opener by reverting to 4-3-3 and asking his players to get the ball on the ground and play the type of football with which they beat Sunderland to the Championship title last season by 24 points.

Twelve passes between all eleven players in a blue and yellow (plus one bright orange) shirt arrived only a couple of minutes after half-time. A one-two between Pascal Struijk and Gabi Gudmundsson quickly quietened the home fans cheering their team’s attempts to win the ball back high up the pitch. A backheel from Noah Okafor opened up the midfield for Anton Stach, whose sweeping pass to the right wing gave Brenden Aaronson the two things I often cringe when he is faced with — time and space. Perhaps the biggest sign things are changing for the better is that as Aaronson got the ball he had clear instructions in his mind, as he told The Athletic afterwards:

“I didn’t even see the first part of it because I was spinning to go out wide and the coach always talks about, ‘We want one guy inside and one guy outside.’ I saw Jayden was a bit inside. I don’t really like going outside because I’m not a winger-winger, but I went outside and I’ve been working on trying to be as direct as I can, find a little bit of space, and put the ball into Dom because I know he’s going to be there.”

Both Aaronson and Calvert-Lewin made the most difficult part of football look simple. Neither Aaronson’s pass nor Calvert-Lewin’s finish were fancy or complicated. They were precise. The right touches at the right time.

Minutes later, they should have been followed by a second goal as Okafor’s cross was flicked on by Aaronson towards the back post, where Jayden Bogle couldn’t bundle the awkwardly bouncing ball either over the line or back to Calvert-Lewin waiting for a tap-in, instead diverting it wide off his thigh. While subsequent opportunities were never quite as clear cut, Leeds were superior in maintaining the pressure. Tanaka fluffed a cutback over with his weaker left foot. With Sunderland bullied deep into their own half, Stach and Ampadu both had attempts from the edge of the box.

The only blemishes on the performance were linked. We are used to seeing Rodon looking hurt — he always appears pained — but it was a worry when he went down twice in the first half clearly struggling with his ankle rather than one of his customary knocks to his noggin. There was an element of predictability, however. On Christmas Eve, The Athletic published an interview with Rodon about his 103 consecutive appearances leaving him only ten away from Norman Hunter’s sixty-year-old record. Rodon’s determination to play on was admirable, but costly — hobbling away from defending a set-piece, he played Adingra onside from Granit Xhaka’s clever pass behind Bogle, giving Adingra the space to impressively arc the ball into Lucas Perri’s far corner. I blame Beren Cross.

Until that moment, it had been a stodge of a game, much like Leeds’ trip to Brentford. Seconds earlier, I had been about to comment to a friend about how nothing had really happened only to be shut up by Adingra. But the goal — and Farke’s turning to Tanaka to replace Rodon rather than the more logical choice of Sebastiaan Bornauw — sparked the game into life. Playing with a brightness we’ve rarely seen during his time at Leeds, Aaronson got on the end of a cross and kept calm to make space and shoot past Robin Roefs, only for Trai Hume to clear the ball off the line. Ultimately, Leeds were grateful it was still just 1-0 at half-time as Brian Brobbey failed to make the most of being put through one on one with Perri before clipping the crossbar with a header after Sunderland countered and crossed to the striker free at the back post.

There are, after all, two teams on a pitch, and Sunderland’s unbeaten home record since winning the play-off final meant it was always going to be a difficult afternoon for Leeds to navigate. The first half showed that playing 3-5-2 isn’t the answer to all of Leeds’ problems, but the second half proved that the players and manager are learning how to adapt and hold their nerve, right down to the final few minutes as Sunderland tried to find a late goal and Ampadu told Bijol to stop moaning and keep fighting.

A win would have felt priceless; failure to take all three points meant Farke vowed there would be “no dancing”. But a draw remained a valuable result to round off an excellent 2025 for Leeds United, with the promise that there can be plenty more to enjoy in 2026.