A late brace from Jack Harrison following Kalvin Phillips’ opener saw Leeds United defeat Crewe Alexandra at Elland Road last night in the 2nd Round of the Carabao Cup.
Manager David Artell made 5 changes from Saturday’s 1-0 defeat against Accrington Stanley with Will Jaaskelainen returning in goal, Billy Sass-Davies and Callum McFadzean were part of a back 5 for the Alex with Oli Finney and Josh Lundstram coming into the midfield. Dave Richards, Shaun MacDonald, Chris Porter and Callum Ainley all dropped down to the bench with Luke Offord missing out through suspension.
The opening chance of the game came in the 24th minute with Harrison having an effort saved by Jaaskelainen before Phillips headed the resulting corner wide under little pressure. Kayne Ramsey would block a shot from Rodrigo in the 32nd minute before Junior Firpo would hit the post with an effort from an acute angle 10 minutes later.
The first Alex chance came in the 74th minute with Mika Mandron knocking down a free-kick for substitute Ainley to force Ilan Meslier to save before the hosts took the lead with 12 minutes to play, Phillips turning in a Harrison corner from close range. The lead would be doubled on 85 minutes with a Leeds counter finished off by Harrison lifting the ball over Jaaskelainen before the winger added the third with Harrison smashing the ball home in the final minute following Jaaskelainen saving from Tyler Roberts.
Our next couple of games see the Alex travel to Charlton Athletic on Saturday before a game at Shrewsbury Town in the EFL Trophy.
What can we take out of this game?
Quite a lot despite the scoreline really. It was a really good performance from the lads (which we can hopefully produce in the league as well as this game) where we matched a side that is amongst the leading runners in the Premier League for around 80 minutes. Will was impressive in goal with the centre-halves of Ramsay, Sass-Davies and Thomas all defending well as the Alex frustrated Leeds for large parts of the game to the point where 3 first-choice players had to come off the bench for them to provide the quality (Patrick Bamford in particular).
Elland Road
Carabao Cup
24/08/2021 8:45 pm
Attendance: 34154
Referee: Ben Speedie
| Leeds United | Crewe Alexandra | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Phillips, Harrison (2) | |||||||
| Meslier | Jaaskelainen | ||||||
| Shackleton | Adebisi | ||||||
| Llorente | 46 | Ramsay | |||||
| Struijk | Sass-Davies | ||||||
| Firpo | Thomas | ||||||
| Forshaw | 61 | McFadzean | |||||
| Phillips | Lundstram | ||||||
| Costa | Murphy | 88 | |||||
| Roberts | Finney | 69 | |||||
| Harrison | Knight | 76 | |||||
| Rodrigo | 69 | Mandron | |||||
Substitutes |
|||||||
| Klaesson | Richards | ||||||
| Ayling | 46 | MacDonald | |||||
| Bamford | 69 | Porter | |||||
| Dallas | Ainley | 69 | |||||
| Cresswell | Griffiths | 88 | |||||
| Summerville | Daniels | ||||||
| Klich | 61 | Johnson | 76 | ||||
Game Statistics |
||
| 28 | Goal attempts | 4 |
| 9 | On Target | 1 |
| 9 | Corners | 1 |
| 13 | Fouls | 8 |
| 0 | Yellow Cards | 3 |
| 0 | Red Cards | 0 |
| 73 | % | 27 |