Leeds United under-23s boss Andrew Taylor has saluted the club’s supporters after a record crowd turned up to watch his young side in action against Manchester City. Despite a determined performance, the Whites couldn’t pick up the result they needed as they lost 3-1 to City on home soil.
It means with just one match to play they are still in danger of Premier League 2 Division 1 relegation as they sit four points above Chelsea, who have two games in hand. However, 21,321 supporters piled into Elland Road to watch the contest on Friday night as the club smashed the division’s previous attendance record which had been held by Everton.
They couldn’t cheer United onto a fifth straight win on home soil, but Taylor believes the experience of playing in front of such a crowd will benefit his players hugely.
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“You think you’ve seen a lot in football over the years,” Taylor said after the game. "That to me is incredible, over 20,000 for an under-23 game on a Friday night.
“It epitomises this club really and since I’ve been here I’ve been astonished every other week. I was speaking to their manager before the game, he said, ‘why are there so many fans here, what’s the occasion?’, ‘Just because we put it out there and said come along and they come’.
“He was astounded and that’s the manager of the Man City 23s and he’s been a manager in the Football League before that and he’s coming here to Elland Road for a 23s game going ‘bloody hell, that’s amazing’. All credit to the fans, before the game I said to the lads, ‘look, this is going to be as close to a Premier League game without being a Premier League game that you’re going to get, you’ve got two good teams, you’re at Elland Road, you’ve got 20,000 fans and both teams need a result’.
“It’s a great experience for the lads and they sort of experience first-team football but in our control.”
Leeds took the lead in the contest as Mateo Joseph fired home from a tight angle, but they fell behind just a few minutes later thanks to goals from Kayky Da Silva and Cole Palmer. They kept pushing throughout the game and Crysencio Summerville and Sean McGurk came close to scoring on a couple of occasions, but they couldn’t find a way through the league leaders, who secured the title with the three points.
Liam Delap scored late to seal the win, but Taylor was delighted with his side’s efforts.
“I’m really proud,” he added. “I’ve just said to them in there I’m proud of the performance, proud of their attitude and proud of the way they approached the game and how we kept going.
“Yes, we’re disappointed we lost the game. It’s natural, you’re going to be disappointed but as soon as we walk out of this dressing room, I want them to walk out with their heads held high. They deserve that, they put on a great performance and we went toe-to-toe with the champions now in our league.
“I think for the large part of that game, if you were a neutral and didn’t know who was who, you wouldn’t have known who was at the top and who was at the bottom.”
