Leeds United were blown away by Southampton at St. Mary’s Stadium after they raced into a 3-0 lead after 35 minutes in the early kick-off on Saturday. Despite Leeds pulling a goal back, they could not fight their way back into the game.
The newly found defensive stability that Leeds had discovered in recent weeks went away just two minutes into the game when Adam Armstrong opened the scoring.
Kyle Walker-Pieters managed to thread a pass through brilliantly to Armstrong who had ghosted in behind the Leeds defence before delicately chipping the ball over Illan Meslier from an acute angle to give the Saints the lead.
The first Leeds attempt on goal came in the fifteenth minute when Georginio Rutter’s curling strike from distance was saved well by Gavin Bazunu.
Southampton doubled their lead just after the half an hour mark when Kamaldeen Sulemana got to the by-line and cut the ball back to Will Smallbone who was arriving in the box and guided his shot excellently into the bottom right hand corner.
Sulemana’s creativity was on display again just a few minutes later when he cut inside from the left wing before picking out Adam Armstrong in space in the box. Armstrong then showed good feet to leave Sam Byram in a tangled up mess on the floor before blasting his shot in from an almost identical angle to his first goal.
Leeds managed to pull a goal back just before the hour mark when Pascal Struijk showed composure to control the ball in a congested penalty area before sweeping his effort home on his weaker right foot.
Leeds then managed to have a spell of momentum but never really threatened Bazunu’s goal.
Dan James had space on the right wing and drove into the penalty area before blasting his shot wide of the post in what was their last significant chance of the game as they struggled to break down Southampton.
Farke spoke after the game in what was arguably Leeds’ worst performance of the season so far.
“I never get used to losing and being in a good mood afterwards. I wouldn’t speak too much about worry. Southampton were more effective in this game. Decisive today was that our defensive behaviour was not spot on.” He said.
Leeds don’t have much time to dwell on the defeat as they take on a struggling QPR side at Elland Road on Wednesday.
