Purgatory & Leeds United
The highyest profile victims of the bursting of football’s first bubble of the modern age, Leeds United have taken a long time to get back on their feet. In the fifteen years since the club was relegated from the Premier League, they’ve dropped to League One, put up with Ken Bates, beat Manchester United at Old Trafford in the FA Cup… it’s been eventful.
How We Used To Live, Part One: Bad Pitches
Football has changed considerably over the last few decades and it will continue to do so. This new series for Fridays here on 200% marks the passing of football as it was, kicking off with perhaps the biggest change that the actual game has seen over the...
The Great Leeds United Badge Debacle
Ah, Leeds United. It's been a while. Compared to the chaos of recent years, this season has so far been a relatively serene by the standards of a club which, in its own way, has come to represent the madness and excesses of the modern game perhaps more...
FA Fluff and Other F…oul Ups
It’s a running joke on English comedian John Oliver’s American cable TV show “Last Week Tonight.” Footage of Trump telling consecutive lies, with Oliver declaring “WE GOT HIM!” to cue huge celebrations. But…they hadn’t “got him.” Trump lies...
Football League Review: Aston Villa’s Slow Motion Replay
It says something for the condition of the club in recent years that the extent to which Aston Villa were swept aside by Cardiff City yesterday afternoon barely even merited that many headlines outside the cities of Cardiff and Birmingham the...
Football Shorts: Arrivederci, Massimo
Few of us had seriously believed that it was going to happen, this time around. With the advantage of retrospect, it looks like this might just have been all the excuse they needed. Leeds United's Massimo Cellino was given an eighteen month ban from all...
Football League Review: League tables may or may not lie
There was a time when there were no league tables at the start of the season. Exactly whose responsibility this eminently sensible decision was is just about lost to the mists of time, but it has only been in the last couple of decades that league tables have started...
Football League Review: Meet the new Leeds, same as the old Leeds
It can be easy to forget just how quickly that pre-season optimism can burn up and vanish in the wind. This summer has seen the return of an old trope in the Football League Championship, that the division's new arrivals are grand that they will merely waltz back into...
Who Would *Want* To Manage Leeds United Now?
In thirteenth place in the Championship table, Leeds United finished the 2015/16 season thirty points from the division's automatic promotion places, fifteen points from the play-off places and nineteen above the relegation places. Were it any other club, with any...
Leeds United: The Two Faces of Massimo Cellino
Well, at least they're not going to get relegated at the end of this season. Last night at St Andrews, Leeds United beat Birmingham City by two goals to one, a result which pushes the club over the fifty point barrier for the season and provides just enough of a...
Leeds United Face A Familiar Sinking Feeling
After thirty-eight minutes of this evening's match at The American Express Community Stadium, those hardy souls that had traveled down to East Sussex in the fruitless support of Leeds United may well have been forgiven for wondering whether seven minutes from...
Massimo Cellino vs Sky Sports & The Football League
As 2015 draws to a close, Massimo Cellino is proving as difficult to predict as ever. In his position as the Football League's very own Schrödinger's club owner - banned twice by the League after his tax affairs in Italy resulted in prosecution, he simultaneously does...
The Pie’s The Limit At Elland Road
There can be times, when looking in from the outside on England's most chaotically run football clubs, that trying to make sense of what is actually going on ceases to be of any significant value. There is no method, only madness - no narrative arc, just a series of...
Is Light At The End Of The Tunnel In Sight At Elland Road?
As the full-time whistle blew at Elland Road on Thursday night, the smell of decay emanating from Leeds United hung heavy in the air. Another home defeat, this time at the hands of Blackburn Rovers, left the team just three points above the Championship relegation...
Leeds United & Steve Evans: A Coming Together Beyond Parody
Over the course of much of the last decade or so, the ongoing travails of Leeds United AFC have become one of English football's more enduring soap operas. From Ken Bates, through relegation to League One and the appointment of Massimo Cellino, there may be no other...
“Full Of Thieves And Crooks” – Massimo Cellino Delivers His Verdict
Twenty-five thousand people listened to it in two hours, and now a lot of them are looking for some answers. Over the weekend, a Leeds United supporter managed to get hold - from, it should be added, publicly available sources - of the telephone number Man Who Be The...
Leeds United & The Lottery Of The Owners & Directors Test
So there, then, is the decision of the Football League. Massimo Cellino has been adjudged by the Football League to have failed its Owners & Directors Test on account of his conviction under Italian law over the non-payment of tax for a boat that he owned. The...
Which Way Now For Leeds United?
In a sense, the single most surprising aspect of Massimo Cellino was its timing. As the office workers of this country fumbled their way through their first cup of coffee of the morning, the news came through from Italy that Cellino had been found guilty of evading...
The Madness Of Leeds United Takes Several New Twists
Well, at least the supporters of Leeds United can take a crumb of comfort from the fact that, after twenty-four hours that has been their club become the laughing stock of the entire Football League, they have a team and a support of which they can till be proud. At...
Leeds United: The “Manager-Eater” Takes Pole Position… Or Does He?
So the ongoing saga of the take-over of Leeds United has taken another few twists and turns this week, and now nobody on the outside of the matter seems to have the first clue what, exactly, is going on at Elland Road. It had been widely expected that a purchase of...
So, Why Is The Leeds United Takeover Taking So Long, Then?
This evening, the supporters of Leeds United AFC could well be forgiven for contemplating the fact that it wasn't meant to turn out like this. When Ken Bates finally surrendered the chairmanship of the club in July of last year, a new era was supposed to be at the...
Ken Bates Loses The Closest Thing He Ever Had To ‘Honour’
Last week, I tweeted that “Bates claims his sacking is “unfair & ridiculous” treatment? Good. A strong taste of his own medicine. Hope he’s a victim of the…treatment he’s gloried in dishing out to others down the years. Hope he sues and loses.”
Ken’s Bidding Or Not? The Daily Mail’s Hatchet Job On The Leeds United Supporters Trust
Earlier this week, Neil Ashton of the Daily Mail was in a "penthouse apartment in Leeds city centre" with Ken Bates, having been granted a rare interview with the Leeds United chairman ahead of Leeds' League Cup quarter-final against Chelsea. It wasn't, it should be...
The Continuing Stagnation Of Leeds United
This being Leeds United, of course, it was always never particularly likely that the takeover of the club by the Bahrain-based Gulf Finance House (GFH) group was going to be completely straightforward. As the winter evenings continue draw in, this groups purchase of...
Ken Bates: “An Ex-Chairman Is A Nobody”
OK, we all know that Ken Bates is an unpopular individual in footballing circles. He is still, though, not as unpopular as he ought to be. There are still those in football, watchers, participants and commentators, who are happy to file Bates under “character,” or...
Is The Tide Beginning To Turn At Leeds United?
We have noted before on this site that football supporters can be considerably more patient than we are ever given credit for. Indeed, some might even say that we are too patient. In recent years, we have put up with increasing ticket prices, the desecration of the...
Who Owns Leeds United? How Football Documentaries Should Be Made
Many years ago, I listened to prize-winning author and ultra-famous Arsenal fan Nick Hornby reading extracts from the book which made his name, Fever Pitch. And the reading was a disappointment. Hornby was good, but just not as funny as the voice, indeterminate and...
Leeds United’s Owners Benefit From “League” Politics
FSF will remain anonymous, then, according to The Football League. No surprises there, but how are we supposed to take them seriously when they talk about transparceny in football club ownership.
Peter Ridsdale: Chairman Turned Repeat Offender
Cardiff City are due in court in a couple of weeks fighting off a winding up order, and the man in charge is a rather familiar one to supporters of Leeds United and Barnsley. Mark Murphy reports on Peter Ridsdale’s repeated misdemenaours and finds a predictable and depressing set of themes.