In his latest column for leedsunited.com, lifelong supporter Jon Howe reflects on the Manchester City defeat and looks at the season ahead.

Howe is the author of two books on the club, ‘The Only Place For Us: An A-Z History of Elland Road’ - which has been updated as a new version for 2021 - and ‘All White: Leeds United’s 100 Greatest Players’ in 2012.



Expectations are a big thing in football, in that, if you don’t have any you won’t get disappointed, but equally, it kills most of the enjoyment in a game also. Which brings us to playing Manchester City; ordinarily a game I would have little expectation of earning much from, except for the many unique factors going into Wednesday night’s game, chiefly the fact that it was everyone’s first league game in six weeks and also that there were so many emotions surrounding visiting players and you didn’t know how this would manifest itself in how the game played out.

Then the game started. And it was immediately apparent that, ‘yes, Manchester City are really, really good and I’m not sure what we can do about this’, and my expectation of maybe eking out a point would require a rear-guard effort of herculean proportions and an enormous amount of good luck. We had both of these for the entirety of the first 45 minutes until they ran out in first half stoppage time, but the fact that I had some expectation in the first place perhaps tells us the most about this current version of Leeds United. And at the end, despite Manchester City’s fairly comfortable 3-1 victory, I still retained some expectation that this season could be recovered.

Small strands of hope pre-kick-off stemmed from our performances against the better teams so far this season – wins versus Chelsea and Liverpool, and honourable defeats to Arsenal and Spurs – and even if these hadn’t always delivered the points we deserved, we had seen that Leeds had been competitive throughout these games and where we had ultimately lost, it had been down to fine margins and big moments. And they can go either way. As soon as the Manchester City game kicked-off, however, it was abundantly clear we were dealing with a very different beast.

I’m not just talking about Erling Haaland here either. The pre-match narrative was centred around his biblical heft, and this is built-up to the point that the contest is portrayed like Rocky is about to be thrown to the lions in the shape of this mythical, uncontrollable, comic book monster and in a match-up that is so ridiculously one-sided that you fear for his opponent’s very existence. That is pretty much how this game played out, except that it’s not just about Erling Haaland when you play Manchester City, and even if you manage to keep him restrained – as Leeds did for all but a couple of flashes in the first half – the rest of the City side can devour you with death by a thousand passes.

It took Leeds about 70 minutes to realise they could expend their considerable energies in a pursuit other than chasing Pep Guardiola’s players around the gusty and rain-battered expanses of Elland Road. Instead they could take the game to their opponents and see what happened. That took bravery, but it also took better quality on the ball, and while the last 20 minutes brought excitement of sorts, it also brought frustration that Leeds only did this when the contest was effectively over. That said, if Joe Gelhardt’s toe-poke had dribbled the right side of the post at the end of a fine Leeds move down the left, who knows? But it’s undeniable that Leeds had been as profligate with the small amounts of possession they had enjoyed in the first 70 minutes, as City had been with the raft of chances they had created.

So where do my expectations for the rest of the season come from? Well, we were robust, disciplined and stubborn for the entirety of the first half in a slightly different formation and without a key player – Tyler Adams – playing in it. We ended the game with a very young side after a series of subs which gave us much more vim and vigour and showed once again that the changing of the guard at Leeds United has some very positive signs. And we were playing Manchester City, and in a nutshell, it will get much easier than this.

I should also add the elephant in the room that is the January transfer window, but that is such a melting pot of unknowns and uncontrollable that it is foolish to place too much expectation on that changing anyone’s fortunes at this stage.

What can change our fortunes is the emergence of Willy Gnonto, and when he is fit enough to resume his devastating period of form, Crysencio Summerville, who you wouldn’t have bet against registering in his fifth consecutive Premier League game had he made a late appearance from the bench on Wednesday night during the period when Leeds were swinging wildly from the ropes and repeatedly laying a glove on a visibly rattled City.

Gnonto was a constant menace, and showed that not only did he have the belief and ability to trouble an elite opponent, he also had the stamina to do so for a full 90 minutes. If anything, Gnonto got stronger as the game progressed, and in tandem with Summerville there is a genuinely exciting dimension to this Leeds United team. Gnonto’s desire and invention was also evidence that nobody’s head went down even when the third goal was conceded.

Of course, these are all things that Leeds have to start showing against the teams around us in the table, which is where we have tended to struggle this season, and is where my expectations start to cough and splutter and threaten to grind to a halt. But perhaps the emergence of these young players – including the increasing usage of the likes of Mateo Joseph, Darko Gyabi and Sonny Perkins in recent weeks – who don’t feel the Elland Road crowd’s expectations so much, will have the biggest influence on how this season plays out?

We all know that simply being ‘Leeds United’ isn’t enough in this division, even if Erling Haaland might think differently. When one of the best players in the world has so much respect for you that he doesn’t celebrate either of his two goals, despite never having played for you, you are doing something right as a football club. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen that happen before. And the special reception reserved for the returning Kalvin Phillips told a story also.

There was a lot of love around Elland Road on Wednesday night, even if the cold menace of professionalism cut deepest of all and ultimately, Erling Haaland had a job to do, and he did it. Love and expectation can carry you a long way, and Leeds United has them in abundance, but perhaps the key to our season is to learn about the cold menace of professionalism, and how to transform love and expectation into getting the job done.