Leeds United writer Lee Sobot with his verdict from the Elland Road stands on the tense 1-0 victory against Stoke and the automatic promotion race.
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00:00 Hello there, Lee Sobot at the Yorkshire Evening Post here from Ellen Road where Leeds United
00:06 swiftly returned to winning ways with a 1-0 victory against Stoke City but really it was
00:12 anything but straightforward in the end as Stoke produced a really good second half fight
00:16 back and in the end Leeds were pretty grateful to Hélène Mellier really for some fine saves
00:23 at the end including a very very good one right at the death and also plucking the cross
00:26 out of the air and it's sort of never dull here is it and it's never easy I suppose but
00:31 all that matters really tonight is that they got the three points what you would say is
00:35 that Leeds had an awful lot of chances themselves in the first half and actually did have some
00:38 good chances in the second half as well but as I say there was a real fight back from
00:41 Stoke and Stephen Schumacher the Stoke boss was saying afterwards how proud he is of his
00:45 players and everything and so that's some very nice words to say about Leeds when we
00:49 asked him whether he thought they'd get back into the Premier League and he said he thought
00:51 they would which makes him even prouder of this performance and he described the atmosphere
00:55 here as class which it was again although it was very very tense in the second half
00:59 and in the end Dan James' strike just after the half hour mark has proved the only goal
01:03 of the game fine goal from Dan James it was one of three players to come back into the
01:07 side as Willy Nonto dropped to the bench and his goal was brilliant obviously he's always
01:11 been criticised James for end product but I mean the number of assists and goals he's
01:15 got this season has been an answer to that back into the side tonight and you know he's
01:18 ultimately proved the match winner Routier fed him out wide Routier was brilliant in
01:22 the first half some of his hold up play was excellent Dan James then just surged towards
01:27 the box sort of jinked one way then the other made space for the shot and then fired into
01:30 the bottom left corner it was a really really neat goal there were loads of other chances
01:33 for Leeds in the first half there should have been more than one up at the interval Stoke
01:36 had a couple of chances but nothing really major but after the break they really did
01:40 come out and respond well as I say Leeds did have chances as well Matteo Joseph came on
01:44 the young striker he looked certain to score when going around the keeper but had his shot
01:49 cleared off the line there were a few other bits and bobs chances as well but as I say
01:53 Melie produced some good saves and there was a lot of shots wide from Stoke and you know
01:57 it's a sort of difficult one to assess but all that matters is Leeds got the three points
02:00 so there was a bit of a twist in the tale because it looked like Ipswich were going
02:03 to possibly lose in terms of trailing twice against Bristol City only to amazingly yet
02:08 again fight back and steal a 3-2 success so that's left the top three as it is with Leicester
02:14 winning as well so still two points behind and you know the games are obviously starting
02:18 to tick down but you'd expect there to be more twists and turns that said I don't think
02:22 Ipswich are going anywhere going away and Leeds are going to have to be pretty relentless
02:25 I think and just get another winning run going but we'll have to wait and see how that plays
02:29 out also Stoke ended the game with 10 men after Ben Pearson was shown off for a second
02:32 yellow that was right at the death and you know Stoke can be proud of themselves they
02:36 did well here tonight but you know Leeds in the end they got the job done yet again really
02:39 I mean the clean sheet was the foundation for success obviously but again it's just
02:44 that theme again a little bit in terms of like needing more chances and missing too
02:47 many chances because they should have been home and hosed really at half time but fair
02:50 play to Stoke finished 1-0 here now on to the end of a very very busy week in the Friday
02:54 night derby at Hillsborough against Sheffield Wednesday and the win there will obviously
02:57 put Leeds second ahead of Ipswich playing that's all for now.