Leeds United 0-1 Sunderland: Shut the curtains

For the first time in my life, I left Elland Road early with Leeds United still chasing a game. There were five or so minutes left of stoppage time and, foolishly, I hadn’t entirely given up hope that Leeds might find an equaliser. But after a Sunderland player went down for what was nearing the 105th stoppage of the game, I lost all interest in waiting to find out whether Leeds would snatch a point and headed for the exit, giving myself a stern talking to about the wisdom of my life choices.

It’s not the first time Leeds have left me in an existential crisis and I’m well aware it won’t be the last. At least the sheer inanity of the supposed Best League In The World™ left me pondering some new philosophical questions. If a game lasts 106 minutes but the ball is only in play for fifty, what is time? If a football match is taking place but one of the teams clearly doesn’t want to play football, should we bother? If Sunderland were playing down the bottom of my garden, would I shut the curtains?

Make no mistake, Leeds contributed to a grim night with a grim performance. Daniel Farke stuck with the same team that went toe to toe with Manchester City, but after ninety minutes of trying not to succumb to City’s death by a thousand passes, Leeds’ players appeared zapped of their energy from the opening whistle against Sunderland. While Joe Rodon, Pascal Struijk and Ilia Gruev exchanged slow passes with Karl Darlow at the back, the midfield were crowded out and incapable of creating space for themselves. The ponderous possession was soon followed by a lump up to Dominic Calvert-Lewin, battling three centre-halves with nobody in a Leeds shirt near him to either help or take advantage of the few occasions he flicked the ball on. Rinse and repeat.

Amid the dearth of flair or imagination, Leeds were relying on Anton Stach’s set-pieces, a number of which were squandered apart from a low free-kick in the first half that was saved by debutant Melker Ellborg and a second-half whip to the far post that was headed in by Rodon only to be ruled out for offside by VAR. Naturally, when one of Stach’s corners did beat the first man, Luke O’Nien got away with putting Struijk in a headlock, despite VAR checking the blatant foul.

It should have been a penalty and had it been converted, Leeds would have been able to play the game they always wanted with Sunderland forced into attempting to occasionally attack. Instead, United kept banging their heads against the wall in collective frustration. Two minutes after Rodon’s goal was disallowed, Ethan Ampadu couldn’t resist his instincts and flicked his arm at the ball when defending in his own penalty area. This time VAR gave it, and Karl Darlow getting a hand to Habib Diarra’s weak spot-kick only to palm it into the roof of his own goal summed up Leeds’ entire night, by the end of which Farke had inevitably turned to his most desperate option of throwing all his attackers on with little thought about how to create any chances for them.

It says a lot that Leeds fans, myself included, are wondering whether it was the worst game of football we’ve ever seen. And boy have we seen some shite. As bad as Leeds were, I’ve seen us play worse plenty of times, that’s for sure, which means our own contribution was only the third worst aspect of the night.

Sunderland’s insistence on killing as much of the game as possible might have been even more brazen than anything we saw from the most cowardly teams in the Championship, while Stuart Attwell’s ability to keep the whistle in his mouth yet refuse to assert any authority on the game became comically bad. I can’t blame the Leeds players for walking into the trap of frustration when I was among 35,000 other Leeds fans losing my head at the same things.

Big advocate of 'Bring Back Shit Football', but not like that.

— Migraine Boy (@migraine-boy.bsky.social) 2026-03-03T22:46:45.259Z

Leeds needed to channel that frustration more intelligently, and not just in the brief moments the ball was in play. Rather than Sean Longstaff stealing O’Nien’s towel ahead of a throw-in, which only helped Sunderland waste more time, I’d have been more entertained by Leeds aping the visitors’ actions and making a complete farce of the game. When Ellborg went down pretending to be injured in the first half so Regis Le Bris could have a team talk with his players, the entire Leeds side should have just walked off and kept Sunderland waiting instead, if only to force the officials into action. If they are so insistent there’s nothing they can do about such an obvious loophole in the game, then take it to its absurdist extreme until they are forced to.

Ultimately, nights like that are better off being quickly moved on from. In that case, it would help if Leeds’ FA Cup tie against Norwich could be pushed forward to tomorrow. Or how about today? What about now? Leeds need a palate cleanser to wash the rancid taste out of everyone’s mouths. Some players in the first XI look like they need a rest. The fanbase needs to see some different players do some different things. Options like Dan James, Wilf Gnonto and Ao Tanaka need some minutes to find some form that means their different skillsets will be able to make an impact in the final ten games of the season. And crucially, those players need to perform without any fucking about like at Birmingham or Sheffield Wednesday earlier in the campaign.

If our experience in the Championship is anything to go by, then Sunderland provided a blueprint for Norwich to follow. However frustrating, Leeds need to be better at taking matters into their own hands. ⬢