Leeds 0-0 Palace: a goalless afternoon and five cards
Leeds United 0-0 Crystal Palace was the only goalless match of the matchday and it was not for want of contact: Adam Herczeg showed five yellow cards, three of them to the visitors. Leeds keep an unbeaten record and Palace a clean sheet they had not managed all season.
Leeds had thirteen shots and put two on target. Palace had twelve and put four on target, and it was the Leeds goalkeeper who had the busier afternoon with five saves to two. Elland Road, with 36,462 in it, watched a match that never quite settled into anything.
Five bookings and nothing else
Jayden Bogle was booked on thirty-eight for a bad foul, Ao Tanaka on sixty-two, Adam Wharton for Palace on sixty-four, Yeremy Pino on eighty-one and Jefferson Lerma in the third minute of stoppage time, all of them for the same offence. There were no substitutions worth recording in the scoreline and no incident that came close to producing a goal.
That is a scoreline Palace will take and one Leeds will not lose any sleep over either. Both sides came in having played matches that produced goals in volume, and both of them stopped.
- No goals
- Shots: Leeds United 13 (2 on target), Crystal Palace 12 (4 on target)
- Possession: Leeds United 50.6%, Crystal Palace 49.4%
- Saves: Leeds United 5, Crystal Palace 2
- Cards: Leeds United 2 yellow, Crystal Palace 3 yellow
- Attendance: 36,462 at Elland Road
Leeds have not lost, and have conceded three
Leeds have nine points from five: two wins, three draws, no defeats. They won 1-0 at Nottingham Forest on the opening weekend, drew 1-1 with Brentford, drew 1-1 at Brighton, beat Newcastle United 4-1 and have now drawn 0-0. Seven scored, three conceded, and only Manchester City have conceded fewer.
The 4-1 against Newcastle is the outlier in an otherwise very controlled month. Four of their five matches have produced two goals or fewer in total, and three have finished level. A promoted side would take that; Leeds are doing it while sitting fifth.
Palace stop conceding, for one week
Crystal Palace came to Elland Road having conceded eleven goals in four matches: 2-0 at Everton, 4-1 at home to Manchester City, a 3-2 win at Fulham and a 3-2 defeat at home to Ipswich Town. Every one of those produced at least three goals. This one produced none, and it is their first clean sheet of the season.
They stay fifteenth on four points with six scored and eleven conceded. One win, one draw and three defeats is not a start that suggests a settled team, but the point at a ground where the home side has not lost is the first evidence of a different kind of afternoon.
The detail worth keeping is that Palace had more shots on target than Leeds, four to two, and were the side closer to winning it. In a season in which their matches have averaged more than three goals, they came to a ground where goals have been scarce and very nearly took three points home.
Two shots on target at home
Leeds will look at their own half of the afternoon with less satisfaction. Thirteen attempts and two on target, at Elland Road, against a side that had conceded eleven goals in four matches, is the sort of return that turns a point into a missed one. They have scored seven goals in five games and four of them came in a single afternoon against Newcastle.
The unbeaten run is real and so is the defence behind it. Three goals conceded in five matches is the fewest in the division, matched only by Everton, and Leeds have now kept the ball out in three of their five. What they have not done is settle a match themselves: three of the five have finished level, and two of those were 1-1.
Adam Herczeg refereed and the five bookings were all for bad fouls, which is a fair summary of the match. Neither goalkeeper had to do anything out of the ordinary, and the one who was busier played for the side that ended the day fifth.
Simulate the rest of the Premier League season
Leeds are unbeaten with three goals conceded and Palace have just kept their first clean sheet. On the Premier League simulator you can take the real table forward and see how far either of those gets them.
- Play the remaining 33 rounds from the real table and the real fixture list
- Run any fixture through the AI match simulator, in tactical view or in the physics arena
- Open the line-up builder for both clubs before you kick off a simulation
- Turn an arena simulation into a vertical video ready to share
"Palace had conceded eleven goals in four matches. At Elland Road they conceded none, and had more shots on target than the home side."