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Carlisle Utd 0 Leeds Utd 2 (2-3 on aggregate)
League One Play-off semi-final 2nd leg

Carlisle United – Westwood, Raven, Livesey, Murphy, Horwood, Dobie, Lumsdon, Bridge-Wilkinson, G Smith, Hackney, Graham. Unused subs – Howarth, Arnison, Thirlwell, Taylor, Madine.

Leeds United – Ankergren, Richardson, Huntington, Douglas, Prutton, Beckford, Howson, Johnson, Michalik, Kilkenny, Freedman. Unused subs – Marques, Carole, Kandol, Hughes, Lucas.

Justice was served in a large measure last night when the team that got 91 points on the pitch during the season and missed the League One title by two points got to the Wembley play-off final. 

The 2-0 Leeds Utd victory over Carlisle United came courtesy of local Leeds lad Jonny Howson scoring in each half.

It was a stunning victory – an adjective often over-used in football but appropriate for this match. Howson scored with 90 minutes and 40 seconds on the clock just as the stadium announcer had said that there would be only one minute of added time. The referee played an extra minute after the goal and Carlisle managed to get the ball in the box but didn’t threaten the Leeds goal and then it was all over. Leeds fans and players celebrated and the Carlisle Utd players were understandably shocked, some in tears.

The fact that there was so little added time was due to the spirit in which the game was played. The game had no bookings – surely a record for a second leg play-off match – and no substitutions. I cannot remember the last time I saw that in a game.

Carlisle United and their fans must feel like they have had something taken from them but in truth the job was only half done after the first leg victory and the overall result was fair.

Carlisle had a better chance than Leeds of securing automatic promotion during the regular season and blew it at the death.

They dominated the 1st leg at Elland Road but didn’t play to the final whistle and how important Dougie Freedman‘s goal was to be. Last night was the reverse of the first tie, with Leeds dominating the match for long periods with Carlisle limited to a handful of chances compared the hatful they made in the first leg. The Leeds midfield played the ball around last night, having been AWOL in the first leg. The Leeds fullbacks, Bradley Johnson and Frazer Richardson were more effective in defence in preventing the crosses that had made Carlisle so dangerous in the first leg and both were tireless in attack, Johnson hitting the post late on with a header and Richardson linking up with the attack and pumping in cross after cross. Jonathan Douglas deserves credit for his hard work in front of the defence too. Worthy of mention was Carlisle-born Paul Huntington who suffers dog’s abuse all night from the home fans but that would have been light relief compared to the threatening phone calls he received earlier in the year from the brain-dead sections of Carlisle’s support – no one savoured the Howson goal more than Paul.

In the end Carlisle Utd were undone by not playing to the final whistle again, when extra-time was surely in the mind of everyone on the pitch including the Leeds home-grow hero Jonny Howson.

The result still doesn’t mean Leeds United are promoted but a trip to Wembley is a fitting reward for the loyal and active support given by tens of thousands of Leeds fans up and down the country this season. It is justice.

Meanwhile spare a thought for Lord Mawhinney who will have spent a sleepless night trying to work out how he can avoid being present at the League One play-off final or what it will be like to spend the worst two hours of his life on national and international television being verbally abused by 50,000 Leeds fans. Let’s hope that as he pours the gin on his cornflakes this morning the wretched little man considers the “revolver in library solution” and does us all a favour.

Well the day finally dawns when the arbitration panel will definitely announce their decision to return the 15 points to Leeds United – or not.

I expected a sense of anticipation, excitement, even fear but there is just one of exhaustion.

This nonsense has been so dragged out by the Board of the Football League and the odious Mawhinney, Peer of this realm (he’s not fit to be Wigan Pier), that everyone is sick of it – Leeds fans included.

The Football League clearly thought that by now the return of the points would have no bearing on the League. But how typical of the Football League to get that, as so much else, so badly wrong.

The return of the points in the middle of the season would have ruffled some feathers but with, say 15 games to go, the Football League could argue that all teams had plenty of opportunities to make up the points. By the end of the season it would have all been an unpleasant, but distant memory.

But by shirking the decision, trying to avoid a humiliating climbdown they noe have a situation where the return of points could effect the destination of the League One championship title (if Swansea lose their last game), the second automatic promotion place and/or order of the play-off semi-finals and the opponents each will face. It could even affect relegation as well as those mentioned.

If Leeds get the points returned necessary for automatic promotion then Saturday’s match against Gillingham becomes a celebration of a great season, a party for the players in front of a 39,000 sell-out crowd at Elland Road. And who would blame them if they took their foot of the pedal after the intense pressure the squad have been under all season, starting on minus 15 points, trying to avoid relegation – at least that was the belief at the beginning of the season. If Gillingham take advantage of a relaxation by Leeds and win, and Cheltenham and Bournemouth lose, the Gills stay up!

With so much at stake, a decision to return any points to Leeds United must result in the immediate resignation of Mawhinney and those on the board that voted to take the ultra vires action against Leeds United.

If Leeds get no points returned then nothing has changed for me as I never ever believed there was any route by which Ken Bates could get the 15 points back. We’ve had our day in court (or arbitration) before an impartial judge and if he rules against us then so be it – on to the play-offs and Wembley!

And so now we wait…

  The club are pushing tickets hard for the final home League One game of the season, stating that over 31000 have already been sold. The opposition is lowly Gillingham, currently residing in a relegation place however the attendance will be boosted by many Leeds fans who remember the fateful 4th round FA cup tie of 25 January 2003 and will, therefore, be pleased to witness the Gills take a final plunge into the bottom tier.

On that day then Premiership Leeds United were denied a win by a late Gills goal following the dismissal of Viduka after Gillingham player-manager, Hessentaler blatantly feigned injury – a deception caught on TV cameras. Under pressure Leeds United manager Terry Venables went on record saying he faked it. It was another nail in the coffin of El Tel’s short, ill-starred career at Elland Road.

So get down to Elland Road, see some cold revenge being exacted and take part in what will undoubtedly be the biggest Football League crowd of the season – in any division! Leeds United fans can be proud of the fact that they hold the current biggest crowd figure of 32501 (v Huddersfield Town) and hold another five positions in the top ten list of Football League attendances this season. A statistic made more remarkable when you consider that few of the opposition teams in League One naturally generate large crowds themselves, with the honorable exception of that other exiled giant of football, Nottingham Forest; thus the attendances achievement is largely one down to the enthusiastic support of Leeds United fans themselves.

Against Gillingham on 3 May, the upper tier of the East Stand will be open for the first time at a Leeds United match in two years and so a near 40,000 crowd is possible. In all likelihood the reason for the opening of the upper tier is not the Gills game but the near-certainty that the club will have one (and hopefully two) sell-out home legs of the play-off matches on the road to the Wembley Play-Off final in May. Those two games alone could be worth £1,600,000 even without the contribution from the Wembley final. The would be a huge deposit in McAllister‘s war-chest for next season – in whatever division in which we end up.

If we do achieve promotion this season it would be nice to set a League One attendance record against Gillingham by which the rest of the division can remember us.