Limited Time Discount! Shop NOW!
The biggest challenge facing Leeds United under the lights at Elland Road was not the threat posed by Nottingham Forest, but the irresistible urge of their own instincts. It was easy to write off the previous week’s thrashing by Arsenal because everything was geared towards Friday night. The crowd was bang up for it and so were the players. In a strange way, that presented its own unique problem.
Straight from kick off, Forest retreated under their astonishingly meek instructions from Sean Dyche, refusing to pressure Leeds beyond the halfway line. Elland Road smelled blood as United started brightly, Gabi Gudmundsson immediately showing he had the beating of Forest’s entire right side. One cross was backheeled towards goal by Brenden Aaronson and deflected out for a corner. Another was narrowly deflected over the bar by Zach Abbott, Forest’s 19-year-old centre-half making his first Premier League start out of position at right-back and realising he was in for a long night. Noah Okafor joined in the fun and nearly gave Jayden Bogle a tap-in at the back post. But as the intensity of the atmosphere revved up, Leeds’ play became more frantic, the adrenaline forcing them to chase a game they still had an hour and a half to win.
Leeds were desperate to take free-kicks and throw-ins near their own penalty area quickly, but it had the reverse effect of dragging Forest up the pitch since the visitors didn’t have the time to shuffle back to the safety of their own half. Pascal Struijk sprinted out of defence in possession only to be caught out of position when Gudmundsson passed it straight back to a red shirt as Leeds conceded a brief flurry of corners. After claiming a cross, Karl Darlow hurriedly threw the ball out to the left-back only to float it slowly through the air, leaving Gudmundsson scrambling to keep it in play as he once again gave it away. Ethan Ampadu rolled a simple pass beyond Aaronson and set Forest on a counter that was only stopped by Darlow’s excellent save from Nicolas Dominguez. From an Elliot Anderson cross, Igor Jesus found space between Bogle and James Justin and headed a good chance wide.
If they weren’t careful, Leeds were in danger of walking into a sucker punch. They had the “fire in the heart” that Daniel Farke frequently references but were lacking the “cool in the head”. And so a season of pleasant surprises took its latest twist: Keep Calm and Give It To Gruev.
Farke absolutely loves Ilia Gruev and it’s not difficult to understand why. Managers love players they can rely on, players they know exactly what they’re going to get from. It gives them time and space to devote to other players who might need more regular attention and instruction. We all know what Gruev does. He tackles and passes and is truly world class at pointing. In the win over Crystal Palace before Christmas, I was struck by the sight of Gruev warming up as a substitute in the first half and using a break in play to call some of his teammates on the pitch over to him so he could give them some advice about something he’d spotted from the touchline. It’s unlikely it was something Farke told him to pass on, because as Gruev revealed in a recent interview, they rarely speak to each other:
“To be honest, I don’t talk to Daniel that much. I know how he operates and what he expects from me. He also knows what he’s getting from me when he plays me.
“For me, it’s about having a feel for what’s important on the pitch, communicating a lot, and helping the team. It’s less about constantly discussing things [with Farke], more about him knowing what he’s getting, and me knowing what I need to show.
“Of course, there are times when you have to wait or don’t get the playing time you’d like. But that’s part of the game, especially at this level.”
Players like Gruev are the absolute backbone of any successful squad. No fuss, no frills, no ego. Just pure commitment and diligence. As we found out in Leeds’ last spell in the Premier League, character can go a lot further than talent. Liam Cooper, Bill Ayling and Stuart Dallas dragged Leeds to 9th. Upon signing supposedly superior players amid an online consensus that United needed to ‘move on’ from those names, Leeds got a lot worse and were relegated, still turning to the likes of Cooper and Ayling to try salvage the wreckage they were at no fault of creating.
After all the worries about whether Leeds had signed enough ‘difference makers’ in the summer, come one of the most important games of the season the quiet lad who started only four league games before Christmas stepped up to do what nobody expected. Leeds had already regained a foothold in the game, Dominic Calvert-Lewin crashing a header against the bar from Justin’s cross, before Gruev got the ball in his own half and Bogle began sprinting from the right wing. If you only experience Leeds United through the prism of social media, you will know Gruev was meant to pass the ball five yards sideways or backwards. Instead, he waited and waited and waited a second more, until he picked exactly the right moment to pick exactly the right pass over Forest’s defence and into Bogle’s path. Still waiting for his first Premier League goal in a Leeds shirt, Bogle stayed calm and, like Gruev, kept waiting until he could slide the ball into the bottom corner.
Almost immediately from the restart, Bogle made the same lung-bursting run, only in the opposite direction, tracking the overlapping Ola Aina to Leeds’ byline and sliding into a tackle as the ball came back off Aina’s ankles and out of play. As the ref pointed for a goal kick, the cheer was almost as loud as the celebrations for his opener.
Elland Road was singing in the rain, and the volume cranked up even louder just a couple of minutes later. Justin played a one-two with Bogle, then a three-four with Aaronson as he surged into the box. After his initial shot was saved and pushed back to him, Justin remained the most composed person in the ground, resisting the temptation to shoot again and cutting the ball back for Okafor to score into an empty net.
Having been one of the few supposed ‘difference makers’ Leeds did sign in the summer, Okafor has underwhelmed for much of the season. Like Gruev, he chose a good time to enjoy his best game in a Leeds shirt. Full of bewitching twists and turns all night, Okafor copied Bogle’s example by following his goal with three consecutive tackles in front of the away end, eventually winning a free-kick and applause from all four sides of the stadium. It’s a cliche that Leeds fans love that kind of thing, but I fucking love that kind of thing. Watching the game back, it might be my favourite moment of the night, if only because it’s the 35th minute and, 48 hours on from being inside Elland Road, I’ve just found out Callum Hudson-Odoi was playing for Forest. I’m not even taking the piss; I genuinely had no idea.
A 2-0 lead was still not enough to quell the nerves of fans I was chatting to at the break, only for Leeds to come out for the second half and almost immediately settle everyone down with a third goal that confirmed all three points. Again, it came via the unlikely creative source of Gruev’s left foot. Only seconds earlier he’d got the ball on the edge of the box and ignored shouts to shoot by laying it off for Okafor, whose own attempt was blocked. Forest could only clear as far as Ampadu, whose header gave Gruev the ball in almost the exact same position. Calvert-Lewin immediately called for a cross and set off towards the near post, Gruev whipping the ball into his path as Leeds’ number 9 chested it into the goal with a brilliantly improvised finish. On first glance, it was the type of goal we used to yearn for Pat Bamford to score: just let it bounce off you into the net. But that would be doing a disservice to Calvert-Lewin, whose movement and touch were that of a crafty centre-forward who knew exactly what he was doing.
Only the stop-start nature of the second half prevented Leeds from adding to their three goals, particularly after Dan James returned from injury off the bench in a bright cameo when his pace threatened to punish Forest further. A late header from substitute human lamppost Lorenzo Lucca was only ever going to be a consolation for the visitors, and I spent much of the second half watching Sean Dyche on the touchline. As if knowing he’s inspired little faith from the Forest support and has an infamously erratic owner keeping an eye on his progress, Dyche refused to look dismayed, constantly applauding the meek efforts of his team like a manager desperate to keep at least his players on side.
The win gave everyone involved at Leeds United the grace of leaving Forest to worry about West Ham’s result at Burnley. West Ham won, but there was no need to fret. Instead I used my weekend to smugly sift through the online meltdowns of Forest, Tottenham and Newcastle supporters. The job isn’t done yet, and United have a run of tough fixtures ahead. But like Leeds on Friday, we need to resist the conditioning of our own instincts and ignore the panic button. The Peacocks have proven enough this season to know it’s time to keep in mind that wise old mantra of Howard Wilkinson: trust your swing. I have no doubt there is still some madness lurking somewhere around the corner before the end of the campaign — Sunderland at home, roughly a year on from last season’s madness, I’m looking at you — and I fully intend to enjoy it. ⬢
