Leeds United 3 Ipswich town 2

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We all knew this game was going to be tight – we’d seen the way Millwall set up to play us last week so successfully and we knew any side built in the image of Mick McCarthy would probably play much the same way. “We do the horrible things fans don’t like to see” he boasted before the game! And so it was, but equally we all hoped that the undoubted X Factor this Leeds squad possess in abundance would be enough this time to overcome the muscle and effort of the opposition.

That proved to be exactly the case and whereas we couldn’t find the magic moments needed against such teams last week we did this time. Conor Shaughnessy gave a great imitation of Pablo at his most creative with a sublime through ball for Pierre-Michel Lasogga to run onto which he buried with a clinical finish. Then we saw Kalvin Phillips ghost in from nowhere to round the keeper and make it two. Finally we saw an in-swinging corner from Pablo go in directly although the media appears to be crediting Bialkowski with carrying it over the line! Maybe had Pontus been playing that would have been the final score – 3 – 0 to Leeds – but in his absence we suffered a lapse of marking to allow McGoldrick a near post header and then Felix parried out a cross-shot right into the path on the oncoming Garner for a second Ipswich goal that kept us on our toes until the end. It was not the first time this season that Felix has done this.

The result is everything though and if Leeds can now follow this up with a convincing performance and at least a point from our trip to Cardiff on Tuesday then everyone will have to sit up and consider Leeds the real deal and the team most likely to pin down one of those automatic promotion spots.

The challenges keep coming and we keep batting them away; hold on tight folks!

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