What the stats say about Leeds United's defeat to Birmingham City Leeds United 1 Birmingham City 2. Joe Urquhart Published: 19:00 Sunday 23 September 2018
Leeds United fell to their first defeat of the Championship campaign on Saturday afternoon as Birmingham City left Elland Road with a 2-1 victory - but what do the stats say about the result?
Well, perhaps the most telling statistic for the Whites can be found in the interceptions column with the Blues breaking up United's play a staggering 22 times compared to Leeds' just four. Mixed with United's careless play in possession, in which they
lost the ball 24 times, they never recovered from a sloppy opening 30 minutes which saw the visitors build a two-goal cushion.
Leeds still managed to complete over double the amount of passes than their counterparts with 545 successful attempts compared to just 222 by Birmingham. Marcelo Bielsa's men took 17 shots with just five landing on target, while Garry Monk's side attempted four efforts on goal scoring twice in the process.
The Blues produced 17 blocks themselves and committed 21 fouls whilst making a whopping 31 clearances. United dominated possession seeing the ball for 71% of the afternoon and also won 33 out of the 47 aerial duels during the fixture.
Blues goalkeeper Lee Camp made four saves, while Bailey Peacock-Farrell made just one crucial stop following his earlier error for Che Adams' opener.
Leeds ended the game with a total of 732 touches compared to Birmingham's 408.What do the numbers say?
Well, it doesn't make good reading in two particular areas for Leeds - interceptions and loss of possession.The Whites sloppy play in the opening half, in which they gave the ball away to their opponents countless times, caused lasting damage that they would never recover from.
United continued to stick to Bielsa's plan of pressing from the front and enjoyed a much more fruitful second period but against a stubborn City defence they came up against an immovable object.
Bielsa's men will need to be much better in possession against Sheffield Wednesday should they want to come away with a positive result at Hillsborough.
Read more at:
https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/sport/football/leeds-united/what-the-stats-say-about-leeds-united-s-defeat-to-birmingham-city-1-9363195