Tresor's strike too little too late
Crewe Keeper Ben Williams pushes Jonny Howson's header past the postLeeds United 1 Crewe Alexandra 1Tresor Kandol's first goal for 19 games arrived late at Elland Road but with the stark realisation that the reward it brought was too little for Leeds United.
The striker's 86th-minute header averted a defeat to Crewe Alexandra which would have shaken badly a club with aspirations of promotion, but the impact of yesterday's 1-1 draw was visibly apparent in the faces of Gary McAllister and his players.
Leeds, by their own admission, have lost their way since the start of 2008, and there is little left at Elland Road to frighten visiting teams, but it will concern McAllister to have seen the trouble taken by his side to prise a point from a clash with Crewe.
The Cheshire club have won two of their last 18 games and possessed no sort of encouraging form in the lead up to yesterday's match.
They are, potentially, a team heading for relegation, yet McAllister did not bother claiming that the draw snatched by his side had been well-deserved. Such a claim would have been groundless. On the contrary, the result did an injustice to a Crewe team who had enough of the game to have been out of sight when Kandol nodded home his equaliser.
Tresor Kandol heads past Williams to score the Leeds goalWith four minutes remaining, it was a strike which brought a sliver of relief to the watching crowd, but there is little comfort to be found in the disjointed performance and mediocre result produced by Leeds.
Their sequence of seven games without a victory is growing more expensive by the week, and the fact that United moved a point closer to the second automatic promotion place in League One as a result of their draw is less striking than the five-point deficit which lies between them and the play-offs.
Jermaine Beckford was absent from yesterday's game through a one-match suspension, and Leeds missed both his pace and his eye for goal.
The striker was due to serve his ban against Doncaster Rovers last week until a frozen pitch culled the fixture at late notice, and his penance yesterday saw Tore Andre Flo start his first match since United's defeat to Doncaster at Elland Road on January 19.
That fixture was the start of the six-match winless run that stalked Leeds before yesterday's game, and in spite of the improvement shown by his players against Nottingham Forest 11 days earlier, McAllister saw fit to rearrange his line-up in preparation for Crewe's arrival.
Bradley Johnson was dropped to the bench, leaving McAllister free to include Frazer Richardson in his starting team as an improvising right winger.
The formation, with David Prutton in the centre of midfield, was slightly unorthodox, but the arrival of four chances in the first five minutes indicated that United's players initially understood their manager's thinking,
Flo's first opportunity came inside a minute when he ran free of Crewe's defence and scraped a shot from 18 yards over the crossbar, and a strike from Alan Sheehan deflected over Ben Williams' goal via a deflection from central midfielder Gary Roberts, one of two players with the same name in Crewe's line-up.
It took Crewe half-an-hour to play their way into the match, by which time their clean sheet had been threatened on several more occasions.
Rui Marques, United's captain for the day, hooked an overhead kick over the bar at the far post after a cleverly-worked corner involving Sweeney and Flo, and Kandol's long-range effort was turned away low down by Crewe's embattled goalkeeper.
The barrage continued with Richardson's curling attempt from outside the box which slipped beyond the post, but when Crewe's confidence and invention surged around the half-hour mark, the remainder of the half became increasingly uncomfortable for McAllister's side.
Kenny Lunt produced their first meaningful contribution when his scuffed volley had Casper Ankergren scrambling to defend his near post, and Nicky Maynard spared Leeds with a fierce and wayward finish after Ankergren's parry from Lunt left the striker unmarked in front of an open goal.
United's keeper was no more able to intervene after Prutton was penalised for a foul on Byron Moore a yard outside the hosts' box. Lunt curled a well-directed free-kick over Ankergren's wall, and the ball struck the woodwork before the Dane could move.
Sweeney had forced Williams into a lively block two minutes earlier after driving Richardson's cross goalwards, but it was, surprisingly, Leeds who were in greater need of the interval by the time referee Mike Pike brought the first half to a conclusion.
The respite was brief. Two minutes after the restart, Lunt's through ball found Roberts onside, and his pass across goal was tucked beyond Ankergren by the on-running Maynard. On the evidence of the previous 15 minutes, it was a goal that Crewe deserved.
The break of the deadlock required an urgent response from Leeds, and Jonathan Howson's flicked header was clawed away from goal by Williams as United attempted to repair the damage.
Richardson's ambitious strike from all of 30 yards had Williams scrambling again in the 56th minute, but Byron Moore almost turned home a second goal for Crewe moments later after meeting Lunt's cross at the near post.
McAllister had already called on Sebastien Carole from the substitutes' bench by then, and Anthony Elding and Johnson were sent on from the bench with 24 minutes to go. But his side were fortunate to remain a single goal adrift when the second Gary Roberts in Crewe's line-up ran clear onto George Abbey's long pass in the 73rd minute and drove a weak shot against Ankergren's legs with only the keeper to beat.
Roberts' was a wasted opportunity, and one which Leeds were able to exploit. With four minutes remaining, and pressure soaking into Crewe's defence, Carole's deep cross reached Kandol at the far post and the striker buried the easiest of headers. It could not avert the feeling that Leeds had fallen a long way short again.
Tore Andre Flo holds the ball up for Leeds. YEP
