Burnley                     2 (Ugochukwu  18, Tchaouna 68)​

Leeds United            0

 

18th October 2025. English Premier League.

21,646.

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My reports are starting to sound a bit like the proverbial broken record; yet again, this was not by any means a poor performance. Yet again, we dominated the statistics, including recording four big chances to just one for the Clarets. Yet, at the end of the day, we returned to Leeds with nothing.

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We simply cannot continue to spurn big chances at the rate we are doing – four more went begging today, including that early chance for Brenden Aaronson that he couldn’t put past Dubravka from 12 yards and the chance that fell to Jack Harrison early in the second half that he hammered into the turf and over the bar. In the Premier League, chances like that are typically buried. Maybe a match-practised Ao Tanaka might have been more alert to divert Joe Rodon’s late header in, too. Overall, we missed the target completely with 12 out of 19 goal attempts. By way of contrast, Burnley only had four shots all day, but they hit the target with three of those!

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It isn’t just the lack of clinical finishing, though; we are also starting to concede goals where maybe the centre of our defence needs scrutiny, too. We’ve conceded two goals in each of our last three games, and not exactly against the cream of the division. I’ve been concerned about some of the goals we’ve conceded lately, but have tended to go with the crowd in the generally held belief that, defensively, we are sound. I’m not so sure now. What really bothers me is that we have a £15 million international centre back on the bench who has been getting rave reviews for his efforts for his nation, yet he’s not had a look in. I firmly believe that, had Rodon or Struijk been injured at the start of the season and had Bijol not had that one-game ban on day one, I really think it would have been Bijol holding down one of those centre-back spots now. For all we know, he may well be better than either or both of Rodon and Struijk. Certainly, the goals we have conceded from corners and set pieces, and today from a straightforward cross, must at the very least cause Daniel Farke to consider Bijol as an option. Yes, Walker’s cross was superb, but should Ugochukwu have been that free in our box? It was a fabulous header by the way, but he was unchallenged and for me, there were too many defenders ball watching rather than attacking the ball.

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This result will not be season-defining, just as losing at home to the Clarets last season wasn’t in the end, but missing big chances at the rate we are doing, and conceding goals two at a time, might well be. It happened at the start of last season, and eventually, the sheer number of chances we started creating meant it didn’t really matter that much that we were never exactly clinical in front of goal. I doubt this season we will be able to create as many chances, so it is vital that we start to hit the target more regularly.

 

For the time being, even with a couple of our best players either injured or not match fit, we still look as if we can be competitive against most teams. We have to turn that into results, though, and start with the game against West Ham on Friday. Once again, it is likely to be a tough ask, with Nuno now in charge down there, but very soon we have a run of fixtures against those cream teams, where we have to accept points will be even more difficult to come by, as Burnley have found already this season.