David Woods

Sun 21 June 2020 9:57, UK

There were plenty of Leeds United fans who were spitting feathers when they saw the EFL had given their side a midday kick-off away from home on Sunday. 

That was made worse when it was revealed that West Brom and Birmingham got to play their midlands derby at 3pm on Saturday afternoon.

Who knows what goes through the minds of the EFL schedulers but it left Leeds with a problem – how and when to get to the game.

Arsenal were panned for flying down for their evening game against Man City three hours before kick-off, and it seems like awful pre-match preparation.

Thankfully, Leeds won’t have that problem after Athletic journalist Phil Hay revealed that the side flew down to Cardiff on Saturday.

Talking in a Q&A on the Athletic on Sunday Hay said, “They flew yesterday afternoon and stayed in a hotel – which is good because it maintained the pre-match routine Bielsa prefers. Certainly no excuses about travel today.”

This is something that had been up in the air and it’s good to have it cleared up in such a positive way.

Leeds were also considering flying down this morning but we’d have been worried about such a big chance to their pre-match preparation.

It’s not a long flight but it’s not an ideal way to get the players ready for their first competitive game in over three months.

Now, the players will have had time to bed in and get a good night’s rest before final instructions this morning.

It’s going to be fascinating to see how Leeds respond to such a long time out.

We hope they come out like a train, or at least like the man City players, who took 15 minutes to find their feet before absolutely dominating Arsenal.

However, we were expecting West Brom to start fast and they looked sluggish in their 0-0 draw yesterday.

In other Leeds United news, ‘I’m sick of this’ – Adrian Durham comes out swinging for Leeds after major controversy emerges