Few football teams can boast an original song as their anthem; fewer still can boast a song originally recorded by the team’s players; and I’m pretty sure only one team can boast an anthem written by the guy who wrote “It’s Not Unusual” for Tom Jones. That team is Leeds.

Marching on Together was released to commemorate Leeds’s 1972 FA Cup Final win over Arsenal. It was on the b-side of the album, accompanied on the a-side by a song simply called Leeds United. The latter is great fun, but it’s too specific to the 1970s squad to be popular nowadays (for lyrics, click here). Marching on Together is a different beast entirely. Fans usually only sing the chorus during a game, as the rest of the song is less widely known (and thus harder to get 20,000 people singing at once!). The original recording was performed by the actual players from the 1972 FA Cup Final, but sounds remarkably good considering none of them were singers.

The first video below is from the celebrations in Leeds after the team won the league title in 1992. There are better quality clips of Marching on Together out there, but none with such passion – there’s a man at 01:22 who looks on the verge of tears. The chorus, at 00:22, always brings back memories. God I miss going to Elland Road – I’ll probably end up blowing all my disposable income on match tickets when I move back to Yorkshire later this year, which can’t be good.

I thought I’d post this next one too, despite the bizarre picture slideshow, since it’s the original recording, as sung by the Leeds squad from the 1972 FA Cup Final. It doesn’t have the same goosebump-inducing quality as the other, but it’s the original and it’s great.

And now the lyrics, in full:

Here we go with Leeds United
We’re gonna give the boys a hand
Stand up and sing for Leeds United
They are the greatest in the land

Every day, we’re all gonna say
We love you Leeds! Leeds! Leeds!
Everywhere, we’re gonna be there
We love you Leeds! Leeds! Leeds!

Marching on together
We’re gonna see you win (na na na na na na)
We are so proud
We shout it out loud
We love you Leeds! Leeds! Leeds!

We’ve been through it all together
And we’ve had our ups and downs (ups and downs!)
We’re gonna stay with you forever
At least until the world stops going ’round

Every day, we’re all gonna say
We love you Leeds! Leeds! Leeds!
Everywhere, we’re gonna be there
We love you Leeds! Leeds! Leeds!

Marching on together
We’re gonna see you win (na na na na na na)
We are so proud
We shout it out loud
We love you Leeds! Leeds! Leeds!

November 25th: Leeds played a regular league match against Cheltenham, losing 1-0. Pundits the world over began to worry (with some satisfaction in many cases) that Leeds were about to start another losing streak. This was foolish, as Leeds completely outplayed Cheltenham, had an equaliser disallowed, and by all the rights deserved to leave the field as victors, which can’t be said of a lot of the games they’ve won this season. I can’t find any highlights, so you’ll have to take my word for it. The Yorkshire Evening Post match report is here.

December 4th: Leeds began their match against Port Vale still dogged by the widespread belief that they would soon implode. They walked off the field 3-0 winners, silencing at least some of the critics. No highlights available, sadly. Click here for the Yorkshire Evening Post match report.

December 8th: Another league match, this time a local derby of epic proportions, with giant Leeds United taking on tiny Huddersfield Town. Leeds left the pitch at half-time 1-0 ahead despite being the second-best team on the pitch for most of the last 45 minutes, but retook the field a changed team and scored three more goals while playing Huddersfield off the pitch. This is probably attributable to Dennis Wise discovering at half-time that vandals – who I think it’s fair to say will be lynched by Leeds hooligans if their identities are ever made public – had covered Elland Road’s statue of Leeds legend Billy Bremner in graffiti. I’ll write about that later in the week, because it sickens me. There’s a match report here, in the Yorkshire Evening Post. For the goals, check out this video:

Leeds fielded a substantially different team to Wise’s first-choice eleven, but given the size of the team’s squad, it wasn’t – on paper, at least – a substantially weaker one. The team changes in full:

David Lucas replaced Casper Ankergren in goal after a good performance in keeping a clean sheet against Darlington. I still think Ankergren is a much better goalkeeper than Lucas, but Lucas did well, and was probably not at fault for Bury’s brace in this match.

Paul Huntington, Simon Madden, and Ben Parker (for a profile of the latter, click here) were slotted into the United defence to give Frazer Richardson the chance to recover from a stomach bug and Jamie Clapham a chance to rest before this weekend’s league match against Swindon. Paul Huntington is a more experienced defender than the other two, but is still very young and only a fringe-first-team player; Ben Parker is young but shows a fair bit of promise and may get the chance to cement a first-team place if Dennis Wise opts not to bring in a replacement for Jamie Clapham, who returns to parent club Wolverhampton Wanderers at the end of the month. Simon Madden’s selection came out of nowhere, to be honest, but he played reasonably well and certainly didn’t embarass himself. Leeds’s defence proved a little shaky throughout the match, especially during set-pieces. On paper, there’s nothing wrong with playing the defence used in this game; in practice, it can be difficult for players who have never played together competitively to gel quickly enough for a serious match, and that may have been a problem here.

In midfield, Leeds selected Filipe da Costa for his home debut, a decision which will haunt Dennis Wise and Dave Bassett after he received a straight red card for a dangerous challenge in the 42nd minute. He’d played pretty well up until that point, and he’s still my favourite Leeds player outside the first eleven, but I imagine the poor guy’s in hell right now.

Wise’s most controversial selection decision was to bench both Jermaine Beckford and Tresor Kandol, instead offering a debut to the pairing of Leon Constantine and Mark de Vries. Jermaine Beckford’s absence was enforced by the stomach bug currently afflicting the Leeds squad, but Tresor Kandol spent the first half of the game on the Leeds bench. Given Beckford’s absence, trying an alternative strike pairing was probably a good idea, and Leon Constantine’s first goal was good enough to erase any doubts about using him in the future. Mark de Vrie’s finishing wasn’t fantastic, but he played well and Leeds certainly created enough chances to win, even if they couldn’t quite bring them all to fruition.

All three goals, plus Filipe da Costa’s red card, are here:

First up, Leon Constantine: an excellent goal created by winger Sebastian Carole, whose beautiful upfield pass gave Constantine a perfect opportunity to put Leeds ahead. Carole really is turning into a class player this season, after spending most of the last season trying (with great success) to convince Leeds fans he was rubbish. I’m glad to see him developing, and at his current rate of improvement, he’ll be more than good enough to play on our wing in the Championship next season.

Then come the goals from Bury: both from corners, both a result of frankly abysmal set-piece defence from Leeds. It’s one thing to concede two goals having been outplayed; it’s another thing to concede from a set-piece situation, the defence of which should be simple and well-practiced. Especially in the case of the second goal, Leeds’s defence looked simply shambolic, and it’s not on at all – two Leeds defenders, having failed abjectly to communicate, both jumped for the same high ball and ended up slamming into each other, leaving an opening for Bury to take the lead and, as it turned out, the game. Defending a corner isn’t complicated and Leeds should not have had such difficulty with it in this game, especially considering that the game against Carlisle was lost on the back of more shoddy set-piece defence. Assistant Manager Dave Bassett agrees, so hopefully Leeds’s defence will spend some time this week learning how to defend a corner.

As for Filipe da Costa’s red card: it may have been a little harsh, but the tackle was certainly reckless and possibly dangerous, and the referee was well within his rights to issue a straight red. Assistant Manager Dave Bassett has already endorsed the referee’s decision, telling the Yorkshire Evening Post: “He’s distraught, the kid. He’s not that type of player to be fair. Filipe is more of a mover, but obviously if you make that sort of challenge, the ref is going to send you off. He gave the rest of the boys an uphill task and he’ll do his running today that he didn’t do in the second half.”

The Leeds Offside Man of the Match: Jim Provett, Bury’s goalkeeper, for a number of exceptional saves without which Bury would have sunk without a trace.

So on to my all-time favourite Leeds player: Tony Yeboah. Ghanian Premier League top scorer two seasons in a row? Check. German Bundesliga top scorer two years in a row? Check. The only player to ever win the BBC’s Goal of the Month award twice in two consecutive months? Check. This is the man who gave me some of the best footballing memories of my life – I still remember being in the stands at Elland Road with my Dad, repeatedly chanting “To-o-ny Yeboah” until I lost my voice. He may have only played regularly for Leeds for one season, but good God, what a season.

Yeboah was born in Ghana and encouraged to play football by his Dad, a former professional player in that country. His performances in Ghana earned him a ticket to Germany in 1988, where he became only the second black person to play professional football there. He joined Frankfurt in 1990 and quickly became their best striker, ranking as the top scorer in German football in both 1993 and 1994 and striking fear into the hearts of every defence he encountered. Luckily for Leeds, Frankfurt’s newly-appointed manager foolishly fell out with Yeboah and two other high-profile players in 1995, and soon forced them out of the squad. Leeds manager Howard Wilkinson swooped in with a then-club-record offer of £3.4 million (roughly $7 million), having been impressed with the striker’s form after seeing him on a TV highlights show. Yeboah is still a legend and fan favourite at Frankfurt, with fans (according to Wikipedia) regularly wearing t-shirts emblazoned with “Zeugen Yeboahs” – meaning, “Yeboah’s Witnesses.” And with good reason: 6 months after Yeboah’s departure, the formerly Champions League-challenging Frankfurt were relegated. Despite efforts to bring Yeboah back to Frankfurt, the club couldn’t afford the star’s new transfer fee.

Yeboah played well in the last few months of the 1994-1995 Premiership season, but it was in the 1995-1996 season that he cemented his cult status amongst Leeds fans, winning the BBC’s Goal of the Month competition in both August and September of 1995, and later winning Goal of the Season for the second of them, his incredible strike against Wimbledon.

The August 1995 goal of the month, against Liverpool:

And the September Premiership Goal of the Month and 1995-1996 Premiership Goal of the Season, against Wimbledon:

Yeboah spent the rest of the season as Leeds’s talisman, leading the squad and earning the love of the fans, who voted him as the first-ever non-British Leeds Fans’ Player of the Year. It’s just a shame that the rest of the squad wasn’t quite good enough for Leeds to make the best of his talents.

Which brings us to Yeboah’s swansong – Monaco. Ah, Monaco. With an in-form Monaco considered one of the tougher teams in the 1995 UEFA Cup, Leeds travelled to Monaco nervously anticipating a difficult game. What they probably didn’t expect was one of the greatest hat tricks in UEFA Cup history, as Yeboah ripped the Monaco defence to shreds and gifted Leeds a 3-0 away win. The hat trick:

Sadly, that season was to be Yeboah’s last real chance at Leeds. A series of devastating injuries suffered while representing Ghana internationally kept Yeboah off the pitch for much of the next season, and after a series of disagreements with new Leeds manager George Graham, the best Leeds striker of the Premiership era left for Hamburg, back in the Bundesliga, on a £1million transfer. He played well there for a few seasons, before his play was seriously affected by allegations of tax evasion, resolving which drained him. In 2001, he left Hamburg for the football leagues of Qatar, where he spent a few (presumably relaxing) years.

Today, Yeboah lives in Ghana, where he runs a hotel called “Yegoala” in the capital city of Accra. When asked by The Times why he is no longer heavily involved in football, he said “I was thinking about the future of the Ghanaian people — people who have no work, people who supported me throughout my football career. So I wanted to do something to employ the people and in Accra I now have some 50 employees.” Since 2006, he has helped organise, and played in, an annual charity football match, the “Anthony Baffoe XI vs Anthony Yeboah XI,” and tutors a number of young Ghanian strikers.

Yeboah at a Glance:

Name: Anthony “Tony” Yeboah
Birthday: June 6th, 1966
Birthplace: Kumasi, Ghana
Nationality: Ghanian
Height: 5′10″
Position: Striker
Time at Leeds: 18 months (Jan 1995 to July 1997)
Appearances: 62 (45 league appearances)
Goals: 33 (25 league goals)
Why’s he great, in a nutshell? Did you watch the Wimbledon and Liverpool videos? Beyond his skill as a footballer, though, he seems like a genuinely good man who is trying to help young people in his own country. I really hope one day I can stay in his hotel and thank him for the memories he gave to me and so many people in Leeds.

I wouldn’t be totally surprised if the actal scale of violence had been exagerated by the extensive police presence – after all, it’s not often that police in Carlisle get to don riot gear and pop up on video. Still, it’s not like Leeds and Carlisle have particularly good records between the two of them when it comes to fan violence.

My prediction of fan violence during the Leeds-Millwall match turned out to be well-founded: feral Millwall supporters apparently smashed in the windows of their bus upon arrival at Elland Road and attempted to goad Leeds fans into violence. Police on horseback responded by charging the Leeds fans, followed by more police who cordoned off the buses, arrested twelve Millwall fans, and escorted the bus into the stadium. Check out the video:

There were also a few altercations at the train station and elsewhere in the city, and Leeds fans were’t totally beyond blame: many of them were probably waiting their deliberately for the Millwall bus to arrive. It’s really beyond a joke, this kind of crap ruins games for the rest of us who aren’t illiterate idiots.

Posting a match report for Millwall is looking increasingly unlikely as Bolivia doesn’t seem to have any computers with an up-to-date Windows Media Player, so here’s the Yorkshire Evening Post’s excellent match report for those who really want to know what happened. And get some perspective on Gus Poyet – see, it’s not just me. Key line: “When Jonathan Douglas established their four-goal advantage in the 60th minute, United’s performance was beginning to border on perfection.” Here we go, here we go, here we go…

While you’re at it, the Yorkshire Evening Post also has a superb, superb interview with/article about Dennis Wise that makes excellent reading.

In other news, my man, Shaun Derry, is fit and back in the Leeds reserves. No telling whether Dennis Wise will slot him back into the first team when he’s match fit, but considering the standard of some of our midfield play this season, I wouldn’t be surprised. Either that or sell him.

And in transfer news, Radostin Kishishev, of Bulgaria and Leicester fame, really wants to come back to Leeds. Seeing as we’ve actually acquired him for the month on loan, it’s all rather good. As a loanee, he was one of our better players last season in the Championship, and it’s good to see him back at Elland Road, even if he has just strained his hamstring in training.

And in marginally less (for marginally less read: completely) interesting news, Leeds midfielder Ian Westlake apparently wants his team to be get to the top. Bless. Still, he produced the best Leeds quote of the week:

“We want to be top of this league, where we deserve to be and where we probably should be. The gaffer’s proud of us and he tells us we’ve done well. But all we’ve done is to get near the play-offs, and in the play-offs. This is Leeds United – they’re not a play-off team in division one, are they?”

And finally, a bit of bragging: as I predicted a few posts back, loan striker Wayne Andrews is heading back to his home team, as Leon Constantine is fit and back in the squad.

Leeds were on the back foot at first, with Leyton Orient receiving two free kicks – both of them a little dubious – in the first ten minutes of play. The second, from a rather dubious Sebastien Carole foul, led to the first goal of the game. I might not be convinced it was valid, but it was a beautiful free kick from Orient’s Sean Thronton. Here it is on YouTube.

Tresor Kandol – one half of Leeds’s superb striking partnership – put an easy shot way over the crossbar early on in the first half, starting a trend of poor-finishing that persisted throughout the match, and ultimately cost Leeds the win. The best chance of the first half, though, came from Orient’s Jason Demetriou in the 25th minute. His excellent strike curled towards the Leeds goal, but bounced harmlessly off the post, and was the last dangerous Orient before the game swung perilously against them in the 32nd minute. After a sloppy challenge on Leeds’s Sebastien Carole, in which he appeared to elbow the player in the face, Orient’s goalscorer Sean Thornton received a straight red card, reducing his side to ten men and putting them firmly on the defensive for most of the rest of the game.

Leeds were firmly in control and on the offensive at the start of the second half, and it was only a matter of time before one of their shots – a fantastic curling effort by Tresor Kandol – made it into the net. Considering the number of shots on goal Kandol had during this match, however, it’s a wonder he was only able to make one of them count: sometimes he looks like Leeds’s best player, while at other times like he’d struggle to hit a barn door. Sebastien Carole, for my money Leeds’s best midfielder, also had a fair number of chances to score, but couldn’t make any of them count.

Kandol was given a golden opportunity to put Leeds in the lead – and make up for his finishing deficiencies – when Orient’s Paul Terry fouled Sebastien Carole (who’s becoming a magnet for fouls at the moment) in the penalty area. The subsequent penalty will live on as one of the worst Leeds have seen in a while: Kandol appeared to be under the impression that he was playing rugby. If that man is ever allowed to take a penalty for Leeds again, I’ll take back every nice thing I’ve ever said about Dennis Wise.

And then, Leyton Orient won the match. Only they didn’t. Kind of. Orient’s Adam Boyd took a shot, which Casper Ankergren saved, then fumbled. The ball rolled over the line before being thrown out by a contrite-looking Ankergren. The referee failed to notice that Leyton had, in fact, scored the match-winning goal and called for play-on, despite 10 incredulous Orient players protesting. Leeds retained their unbeaten status with a deserved, but wrong, draw.

leeds.theoffside.com Man of the Match: Nigel Miller (the referee). Seriously, who else can we pick? If he hadn’t disallowed our last goal, Leyton Orient would have broken Leeds’s unbeaten run. Thanks, Nigel.

Anyway – onto the match. Apologies for posting so late in the week, but I only just got access to video. Unfortunately, I can’t post any highlights, because it’s only available through a subscription to Leeds United’s official website. Blame Ken Bates – I know I do.

Brighton were always going to be tough, but I don’t think anyone expected a game as tight as this one. Despite going unbeaten in 12 games, Leeds’s form has been inconsistent, with the midfield in particular unable to dictate the pace of play against competent opponents. That was bourne out in last weekend’s fixture against a solid Brighton team, which Leeds managed to win 1-0 despite being the second-best team on the pitch for most of the afternoon.

The first half was uneventful, livened up, if only briefly, by Jermaine Beckford’s yellow card for a sloppy collision with Brighton goalkeeper Michael Kuipers. Neither side managed many shots on goal at all during the match, but Brighton generally looked the more dangerous side. Leeds’s defence has been one of the team’s best features all season, and today was no exception – the ability of a team to grind out goals and defend stubbornly even when out of form is a hallmark of a winning side, and despite Leeds’s second-rate performance in this match, it gives me considerable optimism for the rest of the season.

Tresor Kandol’s 78th minute match-winner – scored from all of 6 inches after a rubbish bit of defending from Brighton’s Adam El-Abd needlessly turned a harmless Frazer Richardson cross into an easy Leeds goal  - might have been a little bit underwhelming, but it did the job, and should help us all forget about his horrifically botched penalty against Leyton Orient. He and Jermaine Beckford had a difficult game in the face of one of the better defences in League One, and in all honesty, that he scored at all was more a matter of luck than of skill. In the 77th minute, I’d probably have put money on a 0-0 draw, a result which was the least Brighton had earned.

leeds.theoffside.com Man of the Match: Kasper Ankergren. Well on the way to earning another League One Player of the Month accolade, Ankergren managed more than one tricky save to keep Leeds ahead in a game that could very easily have gone Brighton’s way. He narrowly beats out Brighton’s Adam El-Abd, without whom – let’s be honest here – Tresor Kandol would never have scored the matchwinner.

The Team: Pretty much exactly as I predicted in my Match Preview last week, and with only one change from the last match against Leyton Orient. Ankergren in goal, Richardson, Heath, Marques, and Clapham in defence. Prutton, Hughes, Douglas, and the always excellent Carole formed the Leeds midfield, whilst Beckford and Kandol teamed up in the attack. On the bench were Westlake, De Vries, Huntington, Lucas, and Andrews. Still no sign of Felipe Da Costa, although I can still hope.

Bookings: Beckford and Marques both received yellow cards, as did Brighton’s Whing.

This Saturday: Leeds face Milwall at Elland Road. Should be a difficult game, despite Leeds’s home advantage, and since the teams each have some of the worst records in English football for fan violence, expect fireworks. Full match preview tomorrow.

Leeds v Liverpool:

Wimbledon:

Bizarrely, I just found Yeboah’s MySpace page. He’s apparently DC United’s Freddy Adu’s uncle.