25 year old key man dismissed as Leeds United play out Hull City stalemate
DANIEL Farke has some puzzles to solve ahead of tomorrow’s home game with Watford after 10-man Leeds United were held to a 0-0 draw at Hull City on Wednesday night.
The Whites dominated up to the hour when centre-back Joe Rodon was sent off for a second bookable offence. Even then it was only in the dying embers of the match at the MKM Stadium that the Tigers threatened to break the deadlock.
Leeds put in a tremendous shift to record their third successive clean sheet but Farke may have to look at utilising his squad as he prepares his men for their third game in six days. It is a heavy workload so the likes of midfielders Glen Kamara and Ilia Gruev may come into the picture as Leeds seek their first home Championship win.
United will be without suspended Rodon, with Liam Cooper expected to get the nod ahead of York-raised Charlie Cresswell to face the Hornets.
Willie Gnonto, who took quite a battering in Sunday’s 3-0 win at Millwall, limped out after 21 minutes with an ankle injury at Hull but his replacement Crysensio Summerville instantly took the game to City.
Summer signing Ryan Allsop had a great debut for Hull denying Georginio Rutter one-on-one before the eye-catching Summerville brought out two excellent saves from the former Cardiff keeper.
Leeds were in total control but could not convert their superiority into goals against the tame Tigers.
The second half proceeded in the same vein with Summerville and Dan James having goal-bound efforts blocked before Rodon’s foul on Aaron Connelly near the centre circle saw the Welsh international defender dismissed. He had been harshly booked by referee Stephen Martin just before half-time and it clearly frustrated Rodon’s manager.
Farke said: “First half was never a yellow, it was not even a foul, no one can explain to me how it was a yellow. You have to deal a bit smarter with the situation, the duel in the second half. That’s where we have to be a bit more self-critical, it changed the momentum of the game.”
Even a man light Leeds looked relatively comfortable with Ethan Ampadu breaking up many Hull attacks and the few times the home side were able to get in the box rock-solid Pascal Struijk was a big barrier. In contrast to his opposite number goalkeeper Illan Meslier hadn’t a shot to save.
As the clock ticked beyond 80 minutes Leeds had either settled for a point or were tiring as Hull started to push them back and should have stolen the points at the death.
With a minute to go a low cross came into the box, Connolly smartly set up Adama Traore with an open goal but to the astonishment of the sell-out 24,221 crowd the Mali international slammed the ball against the post.
Although Hull didn’t have a shot on target, the stalemate extended their unbeaten run to six and nudged them into sixth while ninth-placed Leeds have not lost in five.
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