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Last orders • The Square Ball

The problem with Champo is that it draws you in. His charms are obvious. No VAR. Fewer scams like Mark Goldbridge. More opportunities to enjoy simple three-point success on a Saturday afternoon. After back-to-back miserable Premier League campaigns, it didn’t take long this season for Leeds fans to settle into second division Stockholm syndrome.

Maybe it’s not so bad after all, right? In the six seasons since Leeds appointed Marcelo Bielsa, we’ve been through three fights for promotion and two fights to escape relegation. Meanwhile, there was the happy year we finished 9th in the Premier League, but that was experienced while relaxing on our sofas at home rather than a stress-free season on the terraces at Elland Road. Which might explain why, as we near the end of another grueling campaign, there have been times when I’ve looked back wistfully to the days of the wilderness years when I could spend the second half in gym bars, chewing the fat with the pair for over a period. a few pints, knowing we won’t miss anything significant in the history of Leeds United Football Club.

Towards the end of Thomas Christiansen’s tenure, I’d wait until near the end of the first half before assuming he’s safe enough to go on the bar, only for Leeds to routinely go a goal down and have a card player brainless red. Sometimes Leeds would make the second half worth watching, such as the thrilling “Lasogga, gerr’in the box you fat cunt” comeback against Millwall. But we still lost that match. And Christiansen couldn’t survive the usual crashes that culminated in Colin’s Cardiff taking his scalp. I sat in the bar for the second half of the same and ended the night puking my guts out behind a gig at Wharf Chambers.

Before this weekend’s game at Southampton, it had been years since I had been on the bar beyond the start of the second half. Leeds either played too well or were too driven by results to ignore real football. The exorbitant ticket price also means you might as well get your money’s worth. My dad tends not to drink at Elland Road these days either, but by half-time against Southampton he’d seen enough. “Once Southampton have scored a third, let’s have a beer and watch some telly downstairs,” he told me. We couldn’t wait for Southampton to put us out of our misery. Where is Laurens De Bock when you need him?

It was hard to tell when the second half even started. The atmosphere in the field consisted of idle chatter between supporters who barely noticed the football on the field. With the play-offs looming, even the players themselves seemed content to finish without incident. It took fifteen minutes for Southampton to put the ball in the back of the net for the third time, prompting me and my dad to immediately head for a pint while others were already on their way to Lowfields Road. Initially it felt like a rush. I even bumped into some of the same faces in the North East Upper carpeted bar that I had six years ago during that 4-1 defeat to Cardiff. I was so detached from football that it took another fifteen minutes before I looked at the TV and realized the score was still 2-1. Southampton’s goal had been disallowed. ok fine What ever.

But it seems I was wrong when I thought I missed that. The experience was just a reminder of how miserable it was when we were last abandoned in Champo. Going to Elland Road is a lot more fun when Leeds are playing well or competing for something. If I want to relax with a beer, then there are plenty of nicer and cheaper ways to do it. My argument against “Premier League is rubbish, it’s much better in the Champo feeling” has always been that the Premier League itself isn’t rubbish – sure, there’s a lot about it that’s awful, but Stuart Dallas scored the winner at Manchester City and finishing 9th was great! – but being rubbish in the Premier League is rubbish.

And if we look up for a second, why should we really fear? Scum and Chelsea are absolutely laughable but are still 7th and 8th. West Ham continue to lose 5-0 and are in 9th. Notts Forest and Everton can afford points deductions and still stay awake. Leeds couldn’t have got things more wrong in our relegation season and still made it to the final day despite competing against clubs who were cheating the financial system. The Premier League might have a lot of things wrong with it, but don’t let Sky Bet convince us that Champo is some kind of haven.

As we’ve learned from the past, it’s getting harder to escape the confines of EFL, so we might as well embrace the terror of trying to get out of there as much as we can. The play-offs may have marked us, but even losing to Derby was one of the most emotional nights at Elland Road I’ve ever experienced. It was never a problem to go to the bar and miss a second of the game. To quote Paul Sykes: no swearing, it’s shit or bust. And that’s exactly how I like it. ⬢

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