Elland Road - Leeds United

Elland Road - Leeds United - 2009

Fortress Elland Road is the home of my team, Leeds United. It is a place I've visited on numerous occasions and despite it being in places a bit dilapidated I think it's amazing.


The day started incredibly badly. I was supposed to be meeting my mate Dom in Leeds for a liquid lunch but somehow managed to miss my train by a good 10 minutes. Totally my fault. Thankfully my friend and fellow Leeds fan Martha was driving up from Watford and was kind enough to help me not miss the game!

Elland Road is a massive ground relative to our division and we don't nearly fill it during league games, with the top tier of the east stand (once the biggest cantilevered stand in the world) normally closed unless demand is especially high. Such demand was required for tonights game - the second leg of the play-off semi final against Millwall which saw Leeds currently trailing 1-0.


I was sat in the West Stand which is the oldest stand in the ground - and it looks like it. Still has wooden seats. It's no coincidence the press gantry is located here to film the rest of the stadium. The South West corner isn't even filled in - so the ground has a massive hole in the corner which is where the (broken) scoreboard was located (it has been replaced with an impressive video wall now).

It was a dry old game. We came out guns blazing second half but paid the price ultimately for missing a penalty. In fact it was such a bad penalty (take a bow Jermaine Beckford) that it seemed that it was a pass into the keepers feet. We left and took the long walk and train back to Sheffield to stay at Dom's.