Leeds deducted 15 points!!!!

This comment was in The Times today. Whilst I am obviously biased, it seems a pretty fair assessment.


The debate: were Leeds unfairly punished?

With each passing week, the Football League�s decision to dock Leeds United 15 points appears less impressive. The club, now bottom of the table with minus six points, have achieved results in their first three matches that would have placed them top on goal difference. If Leeds broke league rules, punishment should have been administered by an independent body. The idea that 71 vested interests, the chairmen of the other clubs, sat around the table giving the thumbs up or thumbs down to such a draconian penalty is entirely flawed.

Lord Mawhinney, the chairman, has political ambitions within football, but cannot expect to be taken seriously after this. No voter in his room was free from motive, even aside from any personal animosity towards Ken Bates, the Leeds chairman. What the club�s 23 rivals in Coca-Cola League One would gain is obvious, but those in League Two may have fancied the additional revenue of Leeds�s travelling support if their team dropped again, while Championship chairmen can do without another potentially big player jostling for Barclays Premier League status. The few that felt moved to back Leeds may have feared one day being caught by the same net.

Say what you like about the Premier League, but the controversial Carlos T�vez hearing was conducted by independent parties, with no potential for gain from the final decision. We may not agree with the outcome or the reasoning behind it, but we must acknowledge the basic integrity of the process. Leeds, meanwhile, have been stitched up by an alliance of self-interest and, out of an attempt to uphold standards, the Football League has contrived to lose credibility by tainting its competition before the start.

Scott Young, a name any Leeds fan will shudder at,how the mighty have fallen

Nah, my first game is going to be the game against Gillingham as am saving hard for RWC and Beer Fest in Munich but I have a very good feeling about this weekend, based on how we got on against Portsmouth mid week! (yeah we lost but until final 10mins only losing 1-0)

four from four, Leeds are making the other teams in League one look like a laughing stock 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/teams/l/leeds_united/6983220.stm

Leeds handed new sanction by FA

2-0 over Hartlepool, well done. I'm really pissed off I never stuck a ton on leeds to win 6 straight though! damn it!!

The gloom is lifting. 

They will soon have passed SUPER MILLWALL ion the league table. Must be all that gravy

Yay, yet another, its like playing FIFA on playstation!

Another win, 5 in row

BIG FAT ZERO

-15 and we're still going up...

Another win, 6 in a row...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/eng_div_2/6984934.stm

Off the bottom!!!

I recon every team we eclipse in the division should sack their mamnager given that we were 15 points behind them on opening day.  Thus Oldham if you listening, time for a new Gaffer

If only my beloved QPR could show the same balls as the Leeds players. We might be playing swapsee at the end of this season unless QPR grow some testicular fortitude.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/eng_div_2/6996386.stm

new club record...

Look at that "pitiful" attendance...

Well done Leeds! Awesome result.

Yeah, well done Leeds - promoted from minus 15 points - that would be some achievment...you wouldn't bet against it after 7 straight wins. liverpoolfan12007-09-23 19:07:51

I managed to get to Elland Road for the matches against Southend and against Luton. Scortching on and off the field. Beckford and Kandel are the business. Leeds must qualify for being called phoenix too - coming back almost from rock bottom. The fans in the Revie Stand and the South Stand are everpresent and vocal in bad times and good  - as the Fever will be for the Phoenix. aladdinkiwiland2007-09-23 19:34:42

Good to see positive comments from QPR and Liverpool - 2 clubs I've always had a lot of time for.

Well said. Good luck to Leeds.

Today on Soccernet.com.......... Lonegunmen2007-09-25 11:55:53

Leeds would be very lucky to get the decision reversed. But their luck may have changed �

 

they can't seem to avoid winning these days despite the fact that in the two games I've seen this season, and in reports I've read of others, they have not totally dominated and have given other teams chances.

 

This is in contrast to a century of bad luck. A curse was said to have been laid on the club by gypsies when Elland Road was build by the Leeds City club at the start of last century, depriving the gypsies of common land where they used to camp and graze horses. There were still always gypsy encampments near the ground on the fields you had to cross to get to the ground when I started going there in the 1960s, and I think more recently though the fields have long been industrial units.

 

We had season after season of being runners up and choking in finals and semis. Then the bad luck seemed to cumulate in the 1969/70 season when they got close to a treble of League, European cup, and FA cup but ended up with nothing. I can say I�ve never been so unhappy as when I walked away from Old Trafford after losing the FA cup final replay to Chelsea that year. Even walking away happy from the same ground after slaying the Great Satan at the start of the following season didn�t start to make up for it.

 

But more recently failing to get into Europe with a team which on paper should have waltzed in, then getting relegated twice (to what was the third division) all seems like a continuation of the gypsies curse.

 

But the thing is � the luck thing has changed. And what�s changed it is this. 

 

Ken Bates.

 

If you�d researched his history you would know that he did not start of life as Ken Bates, but had an altogether longer and harder to pronounce Romani name.  He was the twenty-sixth illegitimate son of a very large but unpleasant gypsy woman, and was born into the swampy backward badlands on the border or Rumania and Czechoslovakia.  His mother never bonded with him due to his hideous ugliness which masses of early facial hair could not disguise, and in 1937, when he was only four, she traded him for two horse liniment suppositories and a used condom, to a German tank crew.  The tank crew had intended to use Kenski for target practice, but he convinced them to let him show them an old circus trick, and they used him as a human cannonball, firing him over the Berlin Wall, which at that time was still only a low fence, to freedom. 

 

 

The rest of course in history, but I believe, love him or hate him, it�s old Ken�s gypsy connections which are proving vital in allowing Leeds the same amount of luck, at last, as other teams, and the opportunity to achieve their glorious destiny.  

Mate, we may not need the 15pts the way we are running down the pack. 

So the FA refused our appeal, despite the precedent they set with West Ham.

Also, our 100% record came to an end with a draw against Gillingham. They scored a 90th minute goal after we had to play most of the second half with only 9 men.

Now, I have never been one for the 'everyone hates us' mentality, but I something isn't smelling right with the treatment Leeds are getting now. By all accounts the yellow cards were a tad harsh...

Yeah, well still early enough in the season.

I see the Leeds fans are behaving themselves again,throwing coins and various missiles at the Ref,about time they were banned from away games.

They wouldn't ban Leeds fans from away games. The revenue and gate receipts they are generating have never been seen at this low level before.

To be honest, their needs to be an investigation. With so many Leeds fans allegedly throwing coins, their should be a review as to why none of them made bloody contact!

As we know Yorkshire people are much like Wellingtonians: warm and generous, and so, if this report is true, which is unlikely, being an old Welsh folk tale, those wonderful lads would only be trying to supplement the poor ref's income.

Another 3 points. way to go Leeds , I can see you guys in the play offs at least, to replace my team:(

   Here's another old Welsh folk tale.
       Once upon a time(well 2002 actually) a football club was sitting proudly at the top of the Premiership on an early January day.They came to play a club who were in League One,far far below them.However as they say pride comes before a fall,and fall they did, all the way to League One themselves,passing the Welsh club who were travelling in the other direction,up not down.
      


 FA CUP  JAN 6th 2002    CARDIFF CITY  2     LEEDS UTD    1

       You see old Welsh Folk Tales are based on the truth!!!

Never had much time for Leeds, but got to take my cap off to you guys the way you are taking on this challenge. You are now only 3 points off the playoff positions and those above that arent that great. Tranmere and Orient

another win. another 3 points.

Be good to pass cardiff on their way down

I'm still pissed off that we dropped points at Gillingham, our only blot on a perfect season so far disco_mart2007-10-10 01:14:51

Good call,see you next year,though I can see us making the play offs. So  who knows?

I think dropping 2 points our of thirty is some going. Top by Christmas would be a realistic goal now. aladdinkiwiland2007-10-11 21:49:54

6 points from the top of the table!! awesome stuff.

Why all this outpouring of sympathy and support for LOL (League One Leeds).