Pub breath

Yeah, perhaps. One of those internet scenarios when you've ended up somehow involved in discussing something much more than you anticipated or wanted, that doesn't actually matter whatsoever anyway I'm sure i'll view it as time well spent when i'm watching the long strings of drool extend on to my thigh for the very last time.

I'm close but not quite ready to be carted off to the padded cell just yet

Nah. Important match for us, nowt more. A "cup final" is what small clubs have against their most bitter, generally bigger rivals when they have little else to play for.

Spoken like a true Leeds....Leicester fan

It's certainly that.. You just have way too much for the league. I'd feel the same about us if we'd got a better start and a decent margin over third. You'll have a few hiccups but most teams won't be able to cope with Leicester this season. You have the strength in depth to deal with injuries. I've rarely called "promoted" about any team in October before but I did Leicester. Friday definitely doesn't change that. You'll be up with little fuss or bother.

Fair enough. I'm not exposed to that. Dragged myself away from active SM engagement years ago. My mental health is better for it and it doesn't sound as if i'm missing out on a whole lot

Second time. First time I visited rotten.com. Took me 20 years to pluck up the courage to try again.

It just matters when you're fighting to get up. One thing both our clubs know is how long you can end up in the lower leagues, if you miss the chance to return immediately. The better players who stuck it out with you for an extra season go and all of a sudden, you've got a squad no better than most around you and the same slim prospects of promotion. Fans and players alike are going to show that emotion, big time. You're pretty much assured of that already, we've got a big job on hands.

Well nope and that makes you look a little like your grapes aren't the sweetest. Seen a few things written about how we supposedly over-celebrated (who set the bar for that?). Unsure if that's about the fans or the players. If it's the fans, then that's badly misguided. We're like that after every win that matters. Some of the celebrations against nobodies in our promotion season trumped Fridays. If it's about the players, well that's understandable. We had a seriously turbulent start, ruined by want away players and the inability to make the signings we needed until we understood the position properly. Since then, we've had solid automatic promotion form and a win away against the runaway league leaders would obviously be a big deal for those players, proving to themselves that we are as good as anyone now. Why wouldn't they celebrate? Saying it's our cup final seems to suggest we have some rivalry with Leicester or don't care about whatever else happens this season. Neither is true, quite obviously. The only reasons it mattered is because is made a statement, got 3 vital points in a promotion push and drew you in closer to us, even if it's only by a smidge. 11 points is certainly much better than the 17 it could have been.

The commentary team didn't seem to see it that way. I try to take out biases out of it. You're much more likely to see it in as a dive because it would be negative to your team if it wasn't. I'm much more likely to see it as a clumsy challenege and a push because it would be positive for my team. Getting past those biases aint easy, however much you try and tell yourself you're being objective. So i'd always try and look at it this way instead. Have I seen similar penalties given in the top two divisions before? The answer is an unequivocal yes. Many times over. If you read my first post on this, I didn't say it was indisuptably a penalty. I simply said 8/10 refs give it and I stand by that. It's given as a penalty more often than it isn't. Whether you think that's more down to poor refs, refs being bought by the dive or the correct interpretation of the rules because there's contact, it matters not much. They're mostly given and that was the only point I was making on the subject. Sam Byram could have been sent off by another ref also. Swings and roundabouts.

There was plenty of contact man. Watch it again. Legs tangled, hand on the back. There was some simulation but when is there not? You can't say there wasn't contact though, the contact was as clear as day.

Well, it wasn't a dive in the sense that there was no contact. There was definitely a lot of contact. He went down easily, for sure. But then so do players every single week and that doesn't seem to make any difference. If there's enough contact then it'll be given, regardless of exaggeration. If penalties were given purely on the basis of whether there was enough contact to cause a human being to fall over, very few pealties would be given.

On Rutter. Two yellows and a red for that would have been one hell of a harsh sending off imo.

Yep. Ndidi being out was likely a huge factor in the game.

Didn't see two challenges that I thought were yellows. One definitely was though. I also thought we would have had a penalty with 8/10 refs so swings and roundabouts.

I am yeah but didn't especially want to advertise that. Not keen on being "that guy" but for what it's worth, i've been on here plenty of times when you've beaten us too. I'm not the gloating type, ugly quality. Anyway, your take is reasonable. I think you defended one on one moments far better than any team we've faced which prevented Summerville, James and Rutter skinning people for fun as they have against most teams. We executed a sound game plan rather than playing the really expansive stuff we've played in other matches. I did think we dominted the middle and our 2 in CM won the game.

Leeds tend not to press hugely in the opponenet's defensive third. A huge amount of your posession was knocking it about at the back. You attacks were very slow in their phases. We don't attack like that and had far fewer passes in our attacking phases. That's why we had more attempts than you, six times the shots on target yet less posession. Posession has never given any indication of attacking intent. If you'd had 60+% posession mostly in our half, that would indicate the deep block take mentioned. That definitely wasn't the case. Leeds 100% did not play that game with a parked bus and a deep block, it's just a really poor assessment of the match.

I'm sorry but that's an awful assessment of the game. Leeds took the game to Leicester and it was only after the goal that the defence went deeper. That's just a brilliant gameplan, perfectly executed. Leeds were the more aggressive attacking team for most of that match.

If a big club maximizes their revenue potential and can spend well and wisely to win things, that's life and that's businesses. The structure of a meritocracy in sport will always favour the teams from the larger cities in that way. Leeds didn't get the biggest gates or make the most commercial revenue in 1992 but we were big enough to compete with what we had, made really smart choices and had some good youth players. I accept that Crewe were never going to win the league then but even with a billionaire, they wouldn't now either. It's always going to be slanted toward the bigger clubs but there's a big difference between being able to generate large income and being handed it by a dodgy state who want to boost their image whilst they bomb the children next door.

A point behind Luton even, which is crazy when you think how good Burnley were last season. The 2 seasons we had fighting relegation were completely miserable affairs. Most weeks either beaten or utterly destroyed. Imagine that for a long stretch? I'm not a wistful "weren't the past bloody great" kinda guy but the sport of football was simply far, far better 20-30 years ago.

Was it ever not like that? Oh aye. Leeds won the last ever Div1 title before the PL started and there were no billionaire pouring their life savings into clubs then, no corrupt Russian Oligarchs or sovereign wealth funds abusing historic English clubs for their sportswashing needs. This really has been the last two decades in the making and is getting obviously and depressingly worse.

Now there's a club showing the world how you can achieve no real success as a small club by deploying highly questionable funding practices that to my small brain, seem to make a total mockery of FFP. What is it that they owe Bloom? Half a billion or more? It's the only way it can be done and it's no longer really sport. It's a competition between billionaire owners, not cities and towns. I can't get excited about a sport that mostly (but not always of course) comes down to who has the best (and usually most bent) billionaire. It makes no sense to be emotionally invested in such a thing.

Yeah, guess that's what I mean by it being a strange feeling. Each game, I want us to win, no doubt about that. With the squad we have, no promotion would probably be a failure and no sports fan wants to feel like their team has failed. The prize at the end of it, well it's a bit of a freshly laid turd in a beautifully presented and enticing looking gift box. Leicester upsetting the apple cart amongst the (dubiously) wealthy elite was a freak enough event 8 years ago but with ever more clubs joining that group, it would be as near to impossible as you can get now. You either join them and turn your gaze away from the awful truth behind how your transfers are actually funded or embrace a future top flight existence of mediocrity at best, emotionally draining crapness and humiliating drubbings at worst. Oh yeah, and VAR Yuk.

Talk to any Forest fan and you'll understand. I'm good mates with one so have seen quite a lot of Spence. I'm really not sure you understand just how good he is mate. You'll see soon enough. It's hardly mind blowing to suggest that a defender who Spurs paid £20m in the Championship, might just be a tad good.

The strangest feeling is, i'm really not all that bothered if we don't. Not sure if some Leicester fans feel similarly. Would be nice to go back up but then you realise what a corrupt, dodgy money ruled, VAR ruined, sterile mess the PL is and we'd probably just end up in a lower table dog fight again. I'm really enjoying the championship again. The football is decent, the games are entertaining, no VAR thank God and it all feels much more real than the PL.