It's a knockout! Playoffs 2019

[Lang Spoon]

Nah man, this is glass half empty ville around here, the bumptious lads are on Football 365 swapping nudey pics and bantz.

[Snake Plissken]

December 2005 I think. They got banned.

[KGR]

For a much-maligned player, Richard Keogh was (yet again) magnificent for his team.

[Ray de Galles]

Didn't see the match, was Derby's 44th minute substitution that brought Marriot on to score a minute later tactical or due to injury? Inspired if the former.

[The-Reverend]

Holmes had a thigh strain, Marriot was warming up from about 20 minutes in.

[Nocturnal Submission]

My sincere sympathies to the Leeds OFTers but I'm delighted for Lamps, Mount & Tomori.

[Nesta]

Way to harsh the buzz, man

[Nocturnal Submission]

Way to harsh the buzz, man

Hey, I was going to say that I was looking forward to the JT-Lamps game but thought that OTF would have a collective meltdown, so decided against it.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

given the febrile political environment in Britain at the moment, maybe this is for the best. the prospect of Leeds turning up in manchester might run the risk of sparking The war of the Roses III

[Janik]

Almost certainly will be, Villa have done us comprehensively twice this season and we cannot get as lucky again in a one off game.

The Football supporter is a naturally pessimistic creature. Here is one, mere minutes after his side have just beaten opposition for the first time in four attempts but have done so in the most important of those four games, immediately going to previous records to state his club will lose their next match as their next opponents have won the last two games against them.[/Attenborough]

[Ray de Galles]

For a much-maligned player, Richard Keogh was (yet again) magnificent for his team.

Looking at the highlights he certainly looks to have been going forward, he sort of needed to after his appalling culpability for Leeds's first.

Leeds' keeper looks a liability too, he got away with one insane charge out of his goal early on but didn't learn his lesson before Derby's opener.

[Ray de Galles]

My sincere sympathies to the Leeds OFTers but I'm delighted for Lamps, Mount & Tomori.

Not Cole?

[statto99]

Surveying some of the wreckage on social media. Surprised at how many are saying, "Oh well! Never mind, eh? There's always next season! We'll definitely go up!". No there isn't. No we won't.

Everyone said that after Garry Monk failed. And after Neil Warnock (good grief, even him and he gets everybody promoted) failed. And after everybody else failed and failed again.

I dared to believe against my better judgement howling inside me not to. I dared to think that with one of the world's finest managers it might finally somehow work. And what I got was just whole new unexplored worlds of failure and humiliation. First team top at Christmas not to go up. First team to hold a play off semi lead to lose the tie. Repeated end of season implosions of composure and discipline to throw the season away at home to Wigan after going ahead, another hapless shambles at Ipswich and now tonight's piece de resistance of reckless, indisciplined self-inflicted capitulation and days of amused onlookers pointing out how hilarious it all is.

I've been through the relegations. They're not so bad actually. You see them coming, you gradually get used to the idea, you brace. And then it happens and the fact of it is almost a release. Also,everything's so crap that you don't much mind how much of it leaves or is sent away. The mid table seasons aren't so bad, either. There's a sense that you're biding your time. Two more players and this could be it.

These failures to complete the success that is within your control and within touching distance for weeks, months, only to be snatched away in front of your face at the last are, for me at least, far worse. You become the fall guy in someone else's success story, destined to be the other team again and again in the "Oh, that fantastic night!" tales. If you're well known enough, destined to be the butt of everyone's jokes for another long stretch. Not able to gradually, quietly deal with it. Because you've failed again and it's so funny and so ace. Somehow, despite years of evidence to the contrary, we're still the big heads who need taking down a peg or two.

So yeah. A pretty bleak place emotionally right now. I don't know. Is this just me? I would have exploded with happiness if we'd somehow made it up. And I'm pretty devastated as another year stretches out ahead with some new, fresh baggage to carry. Does everybody else manage to be saying, "Hey, you have to laugh though, don't you?" within a couple of hours of this, especially if it's happened a lot and gets as much publicity and rubber necking? Genuinely interested to hear how it is for others.

[statto99]

Looking at the highlights he certainly looks to have been going forward, he sort of needed to after his appalling culpability for Leeds's first.

Leeds' keeper looks a liability too, he got away with one insane charge out of his goal early on but didn't learn his lesson before Derby's opener.

He did the same against Ipswich. He doesn't seem to learn and liability seems to be the right word. I don't know if we can get rid or if we're stuck with him. And I'm dreading to think which good homegrown players will now have to be sold to Burnley and West Ham to keep the financial ship afloat.

[Nocturnal Submission]

Not Cole?

As a favour to OTF, mentioning him was a step too far that I wasn't prepared to take, in the same way that I've omitted any reference to Jody Morris's contribution.

[Ray de Galles]

That long post there is an excellent one and sums it all up, it certainly chimes with my recollections of repeated end of season chokes Cardiff managed under Dave Jones starting a decade ago.

I think the second tier tier is the most maddening for such failures as well, being so close to the Big Show and having it slip from your grasp does tend to send entire clubs demented after a while.

[statto99]

Teams that have been in the Prem more recently than us:

Arsenal
Villa
Birmingham
Blackburn
Bolton
Charlton
Chelsea
Palace
Everton
Fulham
Liverpool
Man City
Man Utd
Liverpool
Newcastle
Norwich
Spurs
Southampton
Portsmouth
West Brom
Sunderland
Wigan
West Ham
Reading
Sheffield United
Watford
Sunderland (again)
Birmingham (again)
Derby
West Brom (again)
Stoke (crikey, after 33 years)
Hull
Wolves
Birmingham (third)
Burnley
Newcastle (again)
West Brom (third)
Blackpool
QPR
Norwich (again)
Swansea
Reading (again)
Southampton (again)
West Ham (again)
Cardiff
Hull (again)
Palace (again)
Leicester
Burnley (again)
QPR (again)
Bournemouth
Watford (again)
Norwich (third)
Burnley (third)
Middlesbrough (again)
Hull (third)
Newcastle (third)
Brighton
Huddersfield
Wolves (again)
Cardiff (again)
Fulham (again)
Norwich (fourth)
Sheffield United (again)
Villa (again) or Derby (again)

I mean, you'd think this promotion to the Prem thing wasn't as impossible as we somehow manage to make it look.

[statto99]

That long post there is an excellent one and sums it all up, it certainly chimes with my recollections of repeated end of season chokes Cardiff managed under Dave Jones starting a decade ago.

I think the second tier tier is the most maddening for such failures as well, being so close to the Big Show and having it slip from your grasp does tend to send entire clubs demented after a while.

Generous, Ray. Thank you. The money involved in Big Show and the money that you keep being given after you've left Big Show, however ignominiously, make it all the more shattering that the penalty is not just staying down, but also not having enough money to compete (hat tip to those that overcome this) and having to sell your best players to those who made it to Big Show.

[statto99]

Worse still that Bielsa is now, of course, a crap, pantomime villain while Lampard is a motivational and tactical genius wonder boy.

[Amor de Cosmos]

So yeah. A pretty bleak place emotionally right now. I don't know. Is this just me? I would have exploded with happiness if we'd somehow made it up. And I'm pretty devastated as another year stretches out ahead with some new, fresh baggage to carry. Does everybody else manage to be saying, "Hey, you have to laugh though, don't you?" within a couple of hours of this, especially if it's happened a lot and gets as much publicity and rubber necking? Genuinely interested to hear how it is for others.

Excellent post. However I've never expected QPR to go up, and these days I don't really want them to TBH. I'm happy to see out my days watching them maintain a secure presence where they are. The last two trips "Up There" were miserable experiences, barring a couple of satisfying victories against Chelsea, which I'd rather not see repeated. A stirring cup run or two would be nice, but aside from that, an entertaining and enterprising 90 minutes once or twice a week will do me. So yes, If we were in Leeds position tonight I'd be well over it all by tomorrow morning.

[ad hoc]

I dunno, statto. A couple of years ago when we lost at the stage you just did I got over it in about an hour or so. The year before when we lost in the final, it took a bit longer.

I don;t think it applies to you, but the problem in the big picture sense is that there are large numbers of fans of both your club and mine who somehow have this sense of massive entitlement and believe that you "belong" in the top flight. Leeds fans for the most part seem to still regard Manchester Utd as their principle rival, for example. Wednesday have the same problem too (alluded to by nmrfox above). The second flight is, actually, a much better and more enjoyable league to be in. At the start of any season, pretty much any team could go down and any team could go up. That's not to say I'm not jealous of Utd for going up this year and I won't be jealous next year, but their promotion is in the wider scheme of things a good thing since they have done it without spending tons of cash and flirting with the extremes of the FFP rules.

It would have been great to see Bielsa in the top flight, but I'm not disappointed in last night's result.

(Though the preponderance of Chelsea in the final is more than a little troubling. I'll have to support Derby, because Lampard's biggest flaw is his Chelseaness. He's not an out and out racist scumbag like Terry.

[E10 Rifle]

Another empathetic round of applause for Statto's post from me: these really can be the worst type of failures, and yeah I've been more upset by my own team's failed promotion bids than their relegations. It's the hope and all that …

I found myself really wanting Leeds to win last night, the easing of a hostility towards them that has its roots not in the 70s and all that, but in the robbery at Elland Road of 13 October 2007 and the generally disgusting club they were in the Bates/Wise period. Bielsa's Leeds is a more appealing top-flight prospect than FrankLampardsDerby.

But remarkable to think that going into next season this means Leeds will have spent 24 of the last 38 seasons outside the top flight. Big club "champions of Europe" type posturing is no more realistic than Preston or Burnley doing it in the 1980s

[all new noj]

Am glad about last night's result, United and Leeds going up in the same season would have been rough. I do like Bielsa but you know, it's still Leeds. Commiserations to statto et al though, it sucks to lose in the play offs.

Unfortunately I will also now have to support FLDC in the final too, mainly due to John Terry, but also Jack Grealish.

[E10 Rifle]

I'm with Villa, on account of Dean Smith's ex-Orient credentials and the fact that he's always come across as a general all-round good guy (I interviewed him once, and he was good company)

[statto99]

Another empathetic round of applause for Statto's post from me: these really can be the worst type of failures, and yeah I've been more upset by my own team's failed promotion bids than their relegations. It's the hope and all that …

I found myself really wanting Leeds to win last night, the easing of a hostility towards them that has its roots not in the 70s and all that, but in the robbery at Elland Road of 13 October 2007 and the generally disgusting club they were in the Bates/Wise period. Bielsa's Leeds is a more appealing top-flight prospect than FrankLampardsDerby.

But remarkable to think that going into next season this means Leeds will have spent 24 of the last 38 seasons outside the top flight. Big club "champions of Europe" type posturing is no more realistic than Preston or Burnley doing it in the 1980s

Thank you, E10. Appreciated.

Just to say, we know the "Champions of Europe" thing is a delusion. We don't mean it, as such. The sentiment dates back to the 1975 European Cup final in which we feel, shall we say, that we were hard done by. It's a statement of ironic defiance. Which is pretty much all we've got these days. And, although it's back in the Paleolithic era, we did actually win a European trophy twice. The Fairs Cup (then UEFA Cup, then Europa League) in 1968 and 1971. So we were "Champions of Europe" in a loose sense. And we lost four other European finals, but that kind of goes without saying.

"Big club" depends what somebody means by that. I mean, there are currently many bigger than us at the moment, but how big is big? Where's the boundary? What's the criteria? In terms of recent playing record, absolutely not. This wanders into the territory ad hoc was walking in earlier and I'll opine more about it later.